A nightmare before Christmas
by Renegade2083
Summary: Lightning is a strong, confident Lieutenant in the LAPD. When a case appears before her eyes, she starts to understand what's going on in front of her until the FBI comes and steps over her. Agent Yun is in charge and refuses to let her investigate. But Lightning doesn't give up and continues on her own. Will they find a way to get along? Rated M for language and violence. [F-L]
1. One

Badge in her hand, she made her way towards the few police officers already waiting near the security banner that had been put up merely minutes ago, pushing away some nosy journalists wanting to know the dirt about what had happened, and why. To every question she received, she only replied with a cold and hard glare, the warning in her eyes being enough for each of them to understand they shouldn't bother her at this early time of the day.

And to be fair, she didn't know what had happened. Not yet at least, but it was only a matter of feet before she could be able to determine what had occurred on the quiet 24th of December morning and showing off her badge to the two detectives planted in front of the body, that when she knew that her entire day wouldn't be as enjoyable as she had hoped it to be.

"Lieutenant," one of the two detectives said in a hush tone, "Sorry I had to call you."

"It's all part of the job. Lead me through it."

Following the detective, they both made their way under the banner and closer to the body. From first sight, she could tell the young victim couldn't have been more than twenty-five years old and based on the blood splatter crossing the road and the slit going from ear to ear, it was clear she had been murdered in cold blood. With one knee on the ground, she snatched the pair of gloves being handed to her and after carefully putting them on, she pushed the few bloodied strands of hair away from her neck. _Spot on_ , she sombrely thought, _it probably killed her in a matter of seconds._

With a frown, she continued the investigation of the body as thoroughly as possible, her eyesight was immediately drawn by her hands and more importantly, her fingernails. Grabbing one finger, she gingerly scrutinized it, checking for any kind of defensive wound or skin that could've gotten under them but sadly, nothing was to be seen.

"The blood is still fresh, this happened what…An hour ago?"

"A neighbour said they heard a fight coming from the floor above. A couple, and they identified her as the girlfriend. Some things were broken but apparently, the two people left at different times. Thirty minutes passed before she left."

"So, we either have a petty boyfriend that waited for her outside or someone else…" Getting back up, she gazed at her vicinity and looked at the building standing only a few feet away from her location. "Make sure she's being brought to the precinct. You," she said pointing at another detective, "let's go up, see what we can find out about our victim here."

"Right away Lieutenant."

Nodding, she lastly asked, "was there anything on her?"

"No ma'am, no wallet and nothing in the area was found."

Giving the body a last glance, Lieutenant Farron nodded and made a beeline towards the building with a single thought clinging to her mind: there was a new killer on the loose, and the timing couldn't have been better.

The building the victim had lived in was rather recent. Built in the early twenty-first century, the whiteness of the hallways reminded her of a mental institution, the marbled tiles and immaculate walls accentuating her intense perception of the place, but the smell was luckily nothing like it. Disinfectant was replaced by lavender, and a hint of vanilla lingered in the air the further she walked up the stairs and soon, the smell was invading everything surrounding her. Not finding it displeasing, her brows however furrowed. Someone else was already inside the flat and the idea of her investigation being taken by another district brought ignited her anger like a match being tossed on gasoline.

As she reached the fourth floor of the building, Lieutenant Farron first rose one hand in the air, urging the man walking behind her to lower the sound of his footsteps hitting the stairs and turned to the right as she reached a first corner. The scent continued to overpower her the closer she reached apartment 49B and now nearly jogging, it took her everything she had not to kick the door down and yell at whoever found themselves behind. But she had learned from her mistakes, and after taking a deep, long breath, she pushed the door that had been left opened, her eyes preying for the intruder like an eagle ready to strike.

Surprisingly however, no one appeared before her eyes as she went through the four rooms assembling the victim's apartment and after blowing out a breath, Lieutenant Farron was back to her primarily focus.

"Alright," she said walking back towards the entrance, "find anything you can about this girl and her boyfriend. We need to find him as soon as possible. I'll go check the bedroom, go in the living-room."

"Yes Ma'am."

Without uttering an additional word, Lieutenant Farron turned around and immediately strode towards the bedroom door. The scent of vanilla still lingered in the air, and it took her less than a second to understand that the perfume had most likely belonged to their victim, who based on the few photographs hanging on top of her dresser, was well-loved by her friends and family. Coming closer to one of the photographs, the young detective was almost fighting off a smile at the sight of the victim standing next to who she only assumed to be a younger sister, a smile that vanished from her mind the moment she thought off the complicated conversation she would now have to conduct.

Placing the picture back on the shelf, she continued her thorough investigation through the entire bedroom and was quickly able to find a few details about the victim. One, she enjoyed sex. A lot based on the many sex-toys, ropes and condoms she owned. Second, she didn't seem to have a boyfriend of any kind. _Maybe she was a prostitute._ Scratching the nape of her neck, she continued to look through drawers, papers and such but wasn't able the only thing that could've helped her figure out who she was: a diary.

Defeated, she went out of the bedroom with a frown, her hands clasped at her hips as she carefully swept the living room with her eyes before being called by her detective from what seemed to be the kitchen. Intrigued, she paced across the room and joined with her colleague kneeled by the sink.

"Check this out," he said handing a bunch of photographs, "Seems like she was following someone."

Arching a brow in his direction, she took the papers and one by one, she looked at them all. In them stood always the same man; tall, in his early thirties, brown hair and brown eyes, meeting with different people and in each of them, he always held a bag and exchanged it for another.

"That's strange."

"Do you think she's like a private investigator," he asked standing back on his feet.

"Or maybe she was following someone she knew. A boss, a colleague," she added with a frown, "I doubt this is a boyfriend and I doubt there ever was one."

"What makes you say that," he asked confused, his head slightly tilted to the side.

"Because of her bedroom. No pictures, no number, no male clothes. And she had a lot of…toys," Lightning answered, swallowing hard. "But I'm not sure."

Heavily sighing, she grabbed a plastic bag from her purse and dropped the pictures inside of them. Perhaps would they be able to find a fingerprint belonging to someone else. Possibly the man she had photographed for what it seemed to be a rather long time, but she couldn't make that conclusion just yet.

Without saying a word, she and her detective continued to scout the apartment for more than half-an-hour before they exited the apartment without more clues to their case.

Standing on the street she looked at her vicinity, a few journalists still waiting for a word, something about this murder she refused to give to them, and with a cold look in her eyes, she made her way towards her car and therefore, towards them. With a hand already covering half of her face, she shook her head no every time one of them asked for details about the incident if they had an idea of the killer or who the victim was and each time, her walking rhythm accelerated. Arriving to her car a few moments later, she opened and closed the door in only a second, slammed the keys in the ignition and left the area as fast as she could and headed towards the precinct.

Pressing on a few buttons at a red light, she listened to the few messages she had received in the two hours she had been out, and vocally responded to her younger sister that yes, she would attended dinner tonight even though the idea repelled her, and promised to bring two bottles of wine, and one of champagne and after finishing, the depressing thought of spending her evening with her family seemed like a horror show. But at the time, she had no right to focus on her own personal problems. Someone was dead, and a killer was on the loose, thinking about anything else was simply pathetically egotistical.

As soon as this was back in her mind, the Lieutenant suddenly pressed harder on the pedal and turned on her sirens to reach her workplace quicker. Thanks to this, it took her less than five minutes rather than fifteen to be out of her vehicle and already climbing up the steps leading her to the first floor.

Pushing the doors open, she nodded in direction of the few agents already on their computer and headed directly towards her boss's office.

"Sir?"

"Ha, Lightning I was waiting for you. You've been on the crime scene," asked Captain Amodar, a tall, large man.

"Yes sir. Do we have any more details about the victim?"

"No, the forensic is currently getting her prints. We should know in a few minutes. Was there anything odd?"

"I don't think she had a boyfriend," Lightning answered while they both turned back to the central room, "We couldn't find a trace of him anywhere."

"Alright, that's already something but let's make sure. As soon as we know her name, contact her family and ask them to come here, okay?"

Nodding Lightning slightly bowed at Amodar and headed towards her office. Turning the lights on, she glanced at her desk and then her window for a few moments and headed towards the latter to open it. Fresh morning air entered the room and taking a deep inspiration, she walked towards her desk, waiting for the call of the forensic telling her who their jane doe was.

No wallet, no jewelry, this woman had been stripped of her identity to slow them down, and that worried Lightning more than she cared about. Who was this woman, and who the hell had decided to play God and wipe her out of existence as they owned her? Breathing out a heavy breath, the Lieutenant closed her eyes and brought her finger to her temples to massage them. Why had she decided to enjoy just one more glass of wine just because? _To be fair, I wasn't supposed to work today,_ she thought, _so it's not really my fault. It's the murderers._

A knock on the door brought her out of her relaxation and instantly made her head jerk up to glance at the intruder. Detective Yuj Dalen was waiting under the frame of the door, his blond hair misplaced on the top of his head. He too should've been on an off-day, and she only hoped it didn't look as bad as him.

"What it is," she impatiently asked.

"The forensic called, they have a match."

Nearly jumping from her chair, Lightning rushed out of her office and ran down the stairs to reach the sublevel. Sliding her card inside the lock, she entered the morgue and slowly breathed to regain her normal breathing.

The forensic offered a tight smile and went closer to the table. "This is Jihl Nabaat, twenty-five. Born in Detroit and suddenly disappeared six months ago, presumed dead. And now, she definitely is."

Arching a brow, Lightning came closer to the table and looked at the lifeless body. "Anything else?"

"Yes, she has a tattoo on her entire leg," the forensic continued with a nod, pushing the drape away to show the drawing, "and I crossed referenced online. She's one the picture right there, but she's different."

In two strides, Lightning reached the laptop and looked carefully at the photograph and indeed, she looked nothing like that. "It's her but it's not. Her hair's different, her muscles, her body fat, her nose, and mouth but it's her." Placing the pictures on the desk, she pointed them and said, "check for prints on them for me please?"

"Sure thing and this picture you see was taken seven months ago. Based on this, she lost more than 50 pounds and gained 10 of muscles. In six months it's extreme." Glancing over her shoulder, Lightning agreed with a bob of the head and went back to the table for further information. "As for the killing, there was no DNA, nothing and I checked everywhere, and the throat was perfectly cut. Went deep enough for her to bleed out within seconds and no one without having committed previous murders could've done this."

"Yes, because if it was rage it would've been messier. It's what I thought when I checked the body," the Lieutenant said, reaching down to carefully observe the wound. "Alright, well thanks. If you have anything else let me know, okay?"

"Sure, thing ma'am."

Sighing, she made her way back to her office and started researching the woman's family to announce them the devastating news. Without surprise, both of her parents and younger sister still lived in Detroit and making it a very long road, Lightning could do nothing but to ask them to come.

After dialling the number more than six times, Lightning was left with no choice but to leave them a short voicemail, asking them to reach her number as soon as they could and hung up defeated. Then, she went to Amodar and warned him as well as her detectives of the situation and was instructed to head back to the apartment for further research to which she reluctantly agreed.

She grabbed her keys from her pocket and went back towards the stairs with her detectives behind her, reaching for her car parked in the middle of the parking-lot when her phone suddenly rang in her pocket. Lowering her paste, she looked carefully at the number and instantly remembered the number she had been forced to enter six consecutive times.

Stopping dead in her tracks, she turned around and placed the phone at her ear. "Hello?"

 _"Hello Lieutenant, we were asked to call this number," a feminine voice worriedly said. "Is this about Jihl?"_

"Misses Nabaat, it is indeed. I'm afraid she was killed a few hours ago…" Carefully listening at the sounds, Lightning waited a few long seconds and pursued, "We need you to come to the precinct in West Hollywood to identify her…"

 _"Los Angeles? Why was she…"_ There was a short pause followed by a sniffle. _"We'll be there as soon as possible Lieutenant."_

"Very well I…" The connection was abruptly cut, and Lightning was left to do nothing but stare at the void. Focusing on her detectives, she said; "The family should be there in a few hours, let's head to the apartment and sweep the room again. Maybe we'll find some answers.

Nodding, both of them followed her towards the car whilst Lightning could only prepare herself to face grieving parents and blew out the breath she had kept between her lungs during the entire exchange.

* * *

Driving back from the apartment before noon, the second search of the flat had been as she had called it, completely useless. Not a single clue had been found, no matter how hard they had looked and now, Lightning was going to do one of the hardest parts of her job, ask the parents of Jihl to identify her body.

She remained silent the entire way back to the precinct, only listening to her two detectives chatting about the case and asking themselves questions, and then continue on with their girlfriends being home and alive. It was a conversation that often occurred when the recovered body was female and them thanking God that their significant other was still in their bed, alive and every time, Lightning had silently agreed.

As a detective, four years ago and on her first murder, Lightning had been terrified to find out the victim had been her own sister, lying dead in a pool of blood and had in time managed to calm down the panic that had build inside of her mind. Though the thought still haunted her every time a victim was found and not being able to see her sister's visage on a corpse usually made her feel lighter.

"When we come back, go see the forensic and see if she found some prints on her, okay?"

"Sure thing Light. Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine. I'm going to meet the parents, it's never a fun time."

They both silently nodded as the car stopped on the lot and the three occupants exited it at the same time. Leading, Lightning went up the stairs and immediately to Amodar's desk to warn him of the parents' arrival before turning back around on her heels and going back to her office.

Turning her laptop on, she researched everything she could on Jihl and realized that her sudden disappearance didn't make any sense. An excellent student, excellent grades, she was going to be an extremely successful lawyer and suddenly, she left everything she had fought for. Willingly Lightning doubted it, but the question still pondered her mind. Perhaps had she decided to leave alone to find the man on the pictures, or perhaps had she been taken by someone else and dragged in Los Angeles. And more importantly, who was she here? Jihl Nabaat was surely not using her real name whilst residing here and figuring out what name she had used would be a very long task.

They'd need to go door to door and… Growling to herself, she rushed out of her office and reached the forensics' morgue, her legs feeling tired from going them and up down since seven in the morning. Finding her two detectives, she ordered them to go back to the apartment and ask every neighbor if they knew her so they could have a name and by the time she had made back up, the parents had arrived.

Clearing her throat, she walked in their direction and offered a smile as her eyes locked with the mother's, noticing how red-rimmed they were as she got closer to them.

"Mister and Misses Nabaat, I'm sorry you had to come," she said as she grabbed their hands.

"It's not your fault Lieutenant," the man she assumed to be the father said, "where is she?"

"She downstairs, please follow me."

Turning around, Lightning headed towards the elevator, this time refusing the use the stairs one more time in the next hour-span. Sliding her key card as they all entered it, she pressed on the sublevel button and waited in an awkward silence for them to finally reach it. Perhaps the stairs would've been less silent after all.

Seconds later, the bell chimed to announce its arrival and Lightning slid between the door in a hurry. A few feet away, she knocked on the door and waited for the forensic to allow for her to come in and when she finally did, she pushed open the door and moved to the side to let the parents reach the table.

From behind, Lightning observed their postures with slouched shoulders. The father was holding the mother's hand, and the mother the daughters, all of them slightly shaking as the drape was pulled away and the following second, the mother's sobs filled the quiet room.

Jihl Nabaat was dead, and an already grieving family was slowly pushed over the edge. "Who, who would do this to my daughter," she cried out, enveloped in her husband's strong arms. "Who would be cruel enough to do this to her?"

Exchanging a look with the forensic, Lightning got closer to the table and gazed at the young girl. Who would do such a thing indeed? "I'm really sorry for your loss, Misses Nabaat."

"She's so thin now…She looks so…different," the younger sister stated, tears in her eyes, "but I see it now."

Biting her inner lip, Lightning looked to the ground and remembered the pain she had felt when she and her sister had needed to identify their parents' bodies. It had been shattering to say the least, but Lightning hadn't been able to show it. Her sister was merely 19 and she had just turned 21, and what she needed to do was to be strong for them both. It was this that had made her decide that being a Captain was her one true goal so she could find the people responsible for crimes and making sure they would never get away with it.

A few minutes were spent inside the morgue, the parents asking questions about the body, the wound and if yes or no she had been raped and to all, the forensic calmly replied and before she knew it, Lightning was left with yet another displeasing task, ask them questions.

"If you don't mind, I would like to ask you a few questions upstairs?"

They both shook their head and soon, they all left the forensic alone in her morgue and went back to the first floor inside a quiet room. Taking a seat in front of them, she brought her clip out of her pocket and pressed the pen against the first page, eyeing them all to find her words. _Remember, don't be cold. Try to._

"Did Jihl have any enemies you know off? Problems with someone?"

The mother was the first one to speak up; "No…She was a lovely girl. She was loved by everyone, she had a heart of gold."

Trying to ignore the voice breaking, Lightning immediately continued; "Did she have a boyfriend?"

"No." This time, the father was the first one to reply, his voice gruff. "She didn't like men, she dated only women."

Surprised, Lightning thought back to her supposition of Jihl having a boyfriend, and the fact she was a lesbian proved how right she was. But then, why pretend to be dating a man and make her neighbours believe it? What tracks did this mysterious boyfriend needed to cover up?

"How was everything at home," she then asked. Glancing at the mother, she noticed the quick and almost indistinguishable look she gave her husband and pretended to have seen nothing.

"It was alright," the husband said without surprise, "she never really went out to see friends and such, she was a bookworm more than anything."

Nodding, Lightning continued to write every information she received and circling the words the father had spoken, she drew a circle around them and marked a question mark next to it. Something in this man's words seemed off, and the look the mother had given him did not help his case.

"What about you," she eventually asked the younger sister, looking only at her, "did you notice…anything?"

She shook her head no, "Not really. She was working a lot and she seemed tired but that's it."

Annoyed by the fact the younger sister refused to look her in the eyes, Lightning quickly let the matter go. "Alright. Thank you all three for coming here. Do you have a place to stay for the night? We might need to ask you a few more question in the following days." They all shook their head. "Very well, I will ask one of my detectives to find you a place to stay and I'll contact you as soon as I can, okay?"

Watching them nod, Lightning led them towards a detective working at his office and after leaving them in good hands, she immediately went to inform Amodar of the situation.

However wary of her suppositions about a possible domestic abuse, Amodar agreed to look into things at their local police and check for any calls or messages about abuse in the city of Detroit, and by the time she was out of his office, the clock was slowly ticking towards three in the afternoon and right in schedule, her stomach grumbled for her attention.

Exhaling, she went back to her office but continued down the hallway to reach the lunch room, checking inside the freezer for something she could have and spotted an apple waiting to be eaten. Eagerly, she brought the fruit to her mouth and took in a big bit of the green-coloured fruit. It wasn't much to eat, it would be enough to sustain her until the dinner only a few hours from now.

The dinner she clearly did not want to go to. She loved her sister with all her heart, but the company she had kept -and more importantly her boyfriend- wasn't a person she had enjoyed spending time with for a reason that she still hasn't been able to figure out. All she knew was that spending time near him was enough to give her a serious headache and the need to punch him in the face.

Checking the time, she suddenly remembered her two detectives asking questions to the neighbours and being almost positive that neither of them would've finished the whole building, she decided to go back to her car and drive back to the apartment for the third time during the same day but this time, she was less bothered.

Somehow, she knew that this case wasn't like the other she had been through in the past years. A daughter living her family, a father looking controlling, a wife looking away and a sister looking down didn't seem like anything normal and thinking about, Lightning was sure the father hadn't cried a single tear whilst discovering his daughter's lifeless body. And of course, with the things she had found in the apartment, the pictures, the toys, something was amiss. But then, why the pictures? To mentally torture her, to make her realize she'd never be able to see them again no matter what she did?

With her apple still in her hand and now eaten to the core, the Lieutenant exchanged it for a cigarette she grabbed from her purse and delicately placing it to her lips, she inhaled the smoke and kept it inside of her lungs for a few short moments.

Still waiting for the light to turn green, the sound of her ringtone echoing inside of her car made her stand to attention. Looking at the name, she let out a sigh, took a puff from her cigarette and pressed _answer._

"Serah, what is it," she asked her younger sister as nicely as possible.

 _"Hello to you too! The dinner is going to be at 8 o'clock in the end, I…took a nap."_

Rolling her eyes, Lightning was finally able to press on the pedal and continued down the street. "No problem, I'm still working the case anyway."

 _"You'll be there, right?"_

"Yes, Serah. Unless something catastrophic happens, which I pray won't, I'll be there."

 _"Alright good, I'll pray too then. See you later, sis', love you!"_

"See you later, Serah," Lightning said before pressing the off button of her wheel and exhaling a sigh of relief.

Although Serah was known to be annoying and sometimes extremely clingy, Lightning couldn't deny that spending the night with her somehow embellished her current day and being able to look at her in the eye and not on a table somewhere in Los Angeles was more than a relief and with that in mind, breathing came easier but sadly, only for a second.

Only a street away from the victim's apartment building, Lightning could perceive something in the distance. From where her car stood, it seemed like two black SUV's parked in front of it and the closer she got, the angrier she became. Those SUV's were unmistakably FBI, and the fact that the Federal Bureau was here to steal her case right in front of her nose was something she deemed unacceptable but when her car finally arrived near the cars, her anger grew tenfold.

Not bothering to take the keys of out the ignition, Lightning stormed in direction of her two Detectives and glared at them the entire way.

"What the hell is happening," she furiously asked.

A scent she couldn't recognize suddenly made her turn around, and for a few seconds, her anger lowered. She didn't who stood in front of her, but for the time being, all Lightning could do was to look inside her eyes of an amazingly emerald-colour.

"Who are you," the woman asked her, emerald eyes suddenly turning darker.

"I might just ask you the same question. What is the FBI doing here?"

For a moment, Lightning was proud to have retorted so quickly but as the smile on the woman's face grew, something inside of her made her realize that this smile was filled with a false hope.

"I'm Agent Yun from the FBI. You're off this case, please move along."

The agent didn't leave her the time to reply and disappeared from her sight the very next second. Astonished and outraged, Lightning stared at the road for what seemed an eternity and when she finally got her senses back, she promised herself that Agent Yun wouldn't hear the last of her and _that_ was something she was sure of.


	2. Two

It was about six in the morning on the twenty-fifth of December when Lightning snuck out of her sister's house and got into her car, already headed to the crime scene with a rage unlike any other.

Though her night had gone surprisingly well even with the presence of Snow Villiers, Lightning hadn't been able to get the fact that the FBI had taken the case away from her so easily, Amodar not being able to do a single thing no matter how loud she had yelled. And yes, the present she had gotten from her sister had been very nice and God knew she had been complaining about her previous watch breaking during a case, but even as she looked at the new piece on her right wrist, all Lightning could feel was resent.

Cigarette between her lips and car-window open, she carefully drove towards the building on empty roads. Sometimes, she was able to spot a person carrying bread and a journal back to their home or spot a car slowly driving past an intersection, but on this Christmas morning, not a soul was to be seen and that suited her just fine.

Living on the East of Los Angeles, the drive to the flat took her no less than twenty-five minutes she spent in a constant state of wondering, questioning the severity of the case and why the Bureau had decided to step over everything that belonged to her. _I can't believe it. But you better be sure I'm not giving up that easily Agent Yun. Oh no, I hope you realize who you're dealing with_ , she thought as a mirthless smiled crinkled the corners of her lips because clearly, they hadn't properly met. And she couldn't wait for them to meet.

As she maneuvered her car inside the West-Hollywood district, Lightning's breath slowly started to accelerate. From afar, she could still see one of the two SUV's parked near the building and one person standing in front of the front door with what seemed to be a rifle in his hand.

"That's going to make it harder," she muttered to herself. "Backdoor or window it is."

Pressing the pedal, she took a turn to the right and continued her way towards an alley. Slowing down the rhythm of the car, she came to a step when she was able to see an emergency ladder leading to every floor and got out of the car without thinking for another second. But the second she got out, her phone suddenly rang.

Like a dancer in the middle of a stage, Lightning did her best to snatch it out of her pocket and respond to the call, hoping no one in the nearest vicinity had been able to hear her ringtone.

"Yes," she whispered as she reached the beginning of the ladder, "found anything?"

"No, sadly. The man on the pictures is unknown and no other fingerprints were found on them _or_ the body. I triple-checked, but nothing came back. And also, nothing else was found about Jihl. We still don't have a real name."

"Fuck." Sighing, Lightning shook her head ever so slightly. "Thanks, Emma."

"You're welcome. And now that the FBI has taken over…What happens?"

"Nothing," she lied. "We're not on the case anymore."

"Alright…I'll send the FBI what I found."

Gritting her teeth together, Lightning thanked the forensic for the warning and proceeded with climbing the steps towards the fourth floor with care. Knowing that windows surrounded the building she needed to do her best, so she wouldn't be seen by any other occupants of the building and eventually she managed to reach it.

With her hand protecting her eyes, she looked through the window for any kind of movement and therefore making sure that no FBI agent would be standing in the middle of the living room, and after a few more moments of investigation, Lightning managed to open the window. Climbing it up as quietly as possible, she gingerly glanced in both her directions and tiptoed towards the bedroom.

But to her greatest disappointment, nothing had changed.

A gun being charged behind her back made her turn around, her own hand already pulling it out of its holster to face her attacker. "You're not allowed here. I thought I was clear yesterday," the woman she recognized to be Agent Yun calmly uttered. "I'm going to give you ten seconds to get the hell out of here."

"You FBI agents think you have unlimited control over everything, don't you," Lightning asked as she pulled her gun away, "You think you can shove that precious badge of yours everywhere and do whatever you please."

A wicked smile drew itself on the Agent's lips and Lightning fought hard to keep her hands inside of her pockets and not let it crash against her jaw. "It _is_ how it's supposed to be," she said, "and if you have an ounce of respect for the Force, you _will_ step away."

Her eyes usually of a light blue slowly began to darken the longer she stared back at Agent Yun, her smile still bright and mirthless but as much as it hurt to admit, she was right. Lightning respected the Force and by extension, stepping away was the only thing she could do.

With a shake of her head, she strode towards the frame of the door under which Yun had positioned herself and slammed her shoulder against hers on her way out of the apartment.

Whilst exiting through the front door, she heard a voice call out and say; "I hope this was the last time we meet, Lieutenant, God only knows my patience has limits," before she stormed down the stairs with her teeth on the verge of breaking.

Pushing the front door open, she ignored the calls of one of the agents acting as a security guard and rushed in direction of her car she had left behind the building and unlocked it the second it appeared in her line of vision. Jumping behind the wheel, she didn't start the car right away but only squeezed the wheel with both of her hands until finally, her anger got the better of her.

With a few punches, Lightning used the wheel as a punching-bag, slamming second after second her fist against the leathery fabric surrounding it until her knuckles turned a dark shade of purple. The pain lingered in her fingers for a few moments, feeling as if electricity had started to sparkle underneath her flesh and with that pain still acting, Lightning started her car and drove off the area with a dark, cruel last look in her rear-view mirror.

It was without surprise that Agent Yun stood in the middle of the road behind the car, her hands clasped at her hips. Their eyes met for a quarter of a second, enough for the same smile to be drawn back to the Agent's lips but this time, Lightning decided to ignore it and to be fair, she was inclined to ignore everything she had been told not to do.

The feeling she had had the previous morning upon arriving on the crime scene had been proved more than one time and now, her thirst for justice was overpowering. But how? How could she continue to work now that the FBI and Amodar had ordered her to stand down and steer clear from the case, no matter what? She would need to be swift, discreet and more importantly, alone. No one could know what she would truly be doing, whether it being her detectives or Amodar. Discretion was key, and Lightning was excellent when it came to it.

With an additional pressure on the pedal, Lightning continued her way towards her house in the center of West-Hollywood and not the precinct as she had been on duty the previous day, ready for what she hoped would turn out to be a perfect plan.

After a few more minutes and after turning at a few more interactions, Lightning was finally parked in front of her garage and was out of the vehicle within only a few moments. With her keys in hand, she slammed them inside the lock and after a quick glance over her shoulder, she entered her house and was enwrapped in warmth. The temperature wasn't cold here in Los Angeles, and after living in Montreal most of her youth Lightning was acclimated to frost but only wearing a thin jacket, the wind that had blown ever since yesterday had been more than annoying.

Her house was like any other household. With a single bedroom, an office, a living room, a kitchen and a bathroom, Lightning was content with the decoration she had added. On the walls hung a few coloured paintings either of landscapes or shadows, the colours of black, red and blue usually being the ones striking out the most compared to the whiteness of the walls.

The soil was mostly made of light-coloured wood from the living to the bedroom, the kitchen and bathroom being the only two ones being covered with beige-coloured tiles and every now and then, a rug would bring out another dash of colour to brighten up the room.

All in all, her house was normal and in the two years she had lived in it, Lightning felt at ease. As she hung her coat on the hanger near the front-door, she first decided to make herself a fresh pot of coffee, the need of caffeine streaming down her veins now being direly needed. Perhaps would it help her to calm down as the Agent's words and therefore accent still echoed inside of her mind. _You will step away. Stupid condescending bitch._

Eyeing the coffee-maker she had instinctively turned on, Lightning snatched a clean mug from one of her drawers and poured herself a large amount of the warm, dark beverage, leaving the sugar and the milk where they belonged: everywhere but in her coffee and with her filled mug in hand, it was now time to head towards her office and start to write all the information she had managed to gather yesterday.

Her office was devoid of objects. Apart for a desk, a laptop and a lamp, the only things filling the rather large room were a library filled with different books and a whiteboard hanging on the wall. Glancing at it, she read the few words from a previous case and walked closer to swipe her drawings off, coffee at her lips.

"Alright," she said to herself with a pen in her left hand, "Let's go."

It had been two years since Lightning had been given a promotion, going from Detective to Lieutenant thanks to the number of arrests she had made as well as the dedication to the job. To her, being a police officer meant many things. It was a commitment to her city, but also to its inhabitants and breaking every sort of promise she might give was something she simply deemed unacceptable. It was also was she was meant to become, and she had it all figured out. Now a Lieutenant, it was only a matter of years before she would be in charge of the precinct, or even another. It didn't matter where as long as she would be in charge.

A smile plastered itself to her lips as she continued writing, thinking about the many things she would be able to do and say the day she would be Captain, and Agent Yun's face instantly popped back inside her mind. For instance, she wouldn't let the FBI do whatever they wish to do, unlike Amodar had done. _He didn't have a choice though_.

Although her thoughts had returned to carnage, Lightning managed to remain perfectly calm as she continued writing suppositions, ideas and more importantly, a plan. Still having access to the precinct's database and knowing where the parents were staying, Lightning had a few ways to find out more about this girl and her murder, and for now, the question that kept coming inside of her mind was the following; _why had she disappeared and was the FBI responsible for it_? Frowning, she wrote the question on her board and brought her finger to her right temple, slightly pressing against her skin. With screwed up eyes, she swiftly turned around and took a seat on her swiveling chair, coming closer to her laptop to turn it on.

She waited a few moments for her iMac to come back to life, and the few seconds that went by were spent pondering the implications of the FBI. It was her only focus and it would ultimately be the answer to almost everything, or at least, it would be the beginning of something much more complicated.

Breathing out a puff of air, Lightning glanced back at the screen and pressed on _safari_ to open up a new page, quickly typing in the police's database website and waited for it to load when her cell phone started to ring from the distance. Looking away from her screen, she got up from her chair and followed the sound coming from her jacket, quickly retrieving the device to place it at her ear. Amodar was calling on her day off, and why remained the question on her mind.

"Captain Amodar?"

 _"Lightning, I know this is your day off but someone is at the precinct. They want to talk to you, and only you."_

Arching a brow, she scratched the back of her head and grabbed her jacket from the hanger. "I'll be right there," she said before cutting the communication short.

Who it was didn't matter, but this would give her a reason to look for more clues in a secure environment. Going back to her office, she turned off the laptop, gulped her coffee and exited her house with a cigarette dangling between her lips. The drive towards the precinct was short, and only minutes went by until she was energetically climbing up the only flight of stairs separating her from her office.

Only a few people were inside of the precinct, understandable since the day had only just begun and the 25th was off for almost everyone in the city. Amodar was always working, not having a wife to come home to anymore he had decided that working was better than doing nothing in his house, and Lightning had agreed. Work came first, leisure second.

As she walked down the hallway, she saluted the two female officers chatting by the coffee-maker and took a turn to the left to enter her office, surprised to see Amodar turning his back at her. But as he moved to the side, the person sitting in front of her desk was the one getting her entire attention. Jihl's younger sister was here, and based on her eyes, she had been crying for more than just a few hours.

"Lightning thank you for coming. I told Jenna the FBI had taken over, but she wanted to speak with you", Amodar said. Skirting around her desk, she gave her Captain a nod and waited for him to be out of the room.

For a while, neither of them talked. Lightning only gazed at the young girl, observing her skin, her neck, and her hands and the more she looked, the clearer it became that she wasn't only grieving. She was also terrified.

"Can I get you a glass of…"

"My father used to hit Jihl," she suddenly interjected, leaving Lightning breathless. "She thought I didn't know, but I did. He never hit me, it was only Jihl because she wasn't like he wanted her to be."

"Do you mean because she was a homosexual?"

"I'd wager it was. When she left, I was…happy for her. I figured she ran away to escape all that…" Jenna drew in a breath and slowly exhaled. "She never showed any sign of leaving. She was the same as always…"

"Would you say she left willingly," Lightning asked, writing everything on a piece of paper.

"At first I thought but…To change so fast. I don't know. I don't know anymore."

Lightning flinched as the young girl suddenly started to cry. Taken aback, she jumped from her seat and grabbed a box of Kleenex she kept on a shelf in case something like this were to happen and placed them before Jenna who instinctively snatched the first one.

"Thanks…You know, I was so angry at first when she left," Jenna continued, "I was selfishly thinking but now…Who could've taken her? And why is the FBI investigating? Is there more than they say?"

Lifting her finger up in the air, Lightning bent down and opened up one of her drawers, retrieving the pictures of the man Jihl had been taken and placed one of them on the table, in front of Jenna.

"Do you recognize this man," she asked her.

Jenna looked at the picture and grabbed it between shaking hand. "I…don't think so. Who is he?"

"We found his pictures inside of your sister's apartment, hidden near the sink. I figured maybe you had seen him somewhere some time," Lightning admitted, disappointed by this outcome.

Running her fingers through her hair and feeling a headache coming her way, she untied the bun on the top of her hair and let loose pink-coloured hair to fall on her shoulders to ease the pain starting to spread at its center. Pushing her bangs away from her right eye, she looked back to her papers and scribbled a few additional words.

"Can you…can you promise me something?"

Glancing up, Lightning placed her pen down and nodded. "Sure."

"Can you promise you'll stop them. Stop the people responsible?"

"I'll do what I can," Lightning said. "And about your father, I'm going to send a…"

"No, please don't. Don't do anything I beg of you," Jenna pleaded, back on her feet. "He wouldn't be locked up, he would find a way back!"

"But if we can find old wounds on Jihl's body…"

"No, don't. That's final."

Surprised by the sudden authoritative tone of voice and dangerous look, Lightning had no choice but to give up. Handing her hand in the air as a surrender, she got up from her seat and made her way back to the door. There wasn't much Jenna could tell her anymore. The real first clue was the father, and Lightning planned on having a small chat with him.

Pressing on the button of the elevator, she thanked Jenna for the information given and waited for the elevator to be sent back to the ground floor. Spinning around, she made a beeline in Amodar's direction and entered his office without bothering to knock.

"Sir, this is bigger than…"

"Lightning let me stop you right there," Amodar annoyingly said. He pointed at the chair and waited for Lightning to take a seat behind his desk before continuing. "The FBI just called me and warned me that a Lieutenant with pink hair had infiltrated the crime scene earlier this morning."

Her stomach started to sink. Had this bitch really decided to tell on her? What was this, fifth grade? "Sir I…"

"I'm not done," he grounded. "Let me make myself clear, Lightning. If I find out you're still investigating on this, you're suspended for three weeks. No badge, no authority. Am I being clear?"

"Yes Sir," she said with a nod.

"Now off you go. I believe it's your day off."

Nodding once more, Lightning exited the office in silence. Trying to wrap her mind around everything that had happened, she exited the precinct with her brows heavily furrowed and her phone at her ear. Right now, the only person who could tell her what to do was probably awake, and she needed her ASAP.

"Hello? Can you meet me in twenty minutes at my place? It's urgent." She then got in her car and drove away with speed.

* * *

The bell rang throughout her house exactly twenty minutes after making the call and carrying two cups of coffee to the living-room, Lightning sauntered towards the door after placing them both on the coffee table.

"Hey Serah, thanks for coming."

"You're a jerk for leaving without saying goodbye, you better have a valid explanation," Serah said entering the house.

Frowning, Lightning led them towards the sofa. "I do, that's why I called you here."

"Alright?"

Taking a seat, Lightning first looked at her sister with a small smile. It was amazing to see how she had changed in the past years. Though her hair was still pink-coloured and her eyes still a bright blue, she had managed to get thin lines of laughter at the creases of both her eyes and mouth and she could only thank Snow for bringing some colour in what could've turned out to be a morose life. At least there was this little thing she appreciated about him.

"Light? You there?"

"Yes, sorry. So, I had a case yesterday and…"

"And the FBI took it from you, you told us that at least ten times today."

"Oh," Lightning said confused. "Well, anyway, the sister of the victim came to see me at the precinct and told me her father was abusive. And Amodar warned me that if I continue investigating on the side, I'm suspended."

"O-kay?"

"What should I do?"

"I don't know. What do _you_ want to do," Serah asked, her head slightly titled on the side.

Lightning shrugged. Truth was, she only had two options; either continue and risk being suspended or worse, fired, or drop the case altogether and keep her focus on something else. But in her mind, her decision had been taken a day ago.

"I want to keep going. I promised Jenna I'd do my best, and that's what I'm going to do. My best."

"I have a feeling that's not all you want to say," Serah said with a knowing smile, her cup of coffee not being big enough to cover it.

"This agent…Agent Yun. She saw me this morning when I snuck into the apartment."

"Lightning that's reckless!"

"I know it was. But I can't do anything if she's still in my way."

"You make it sound like you're going to kill her," Serah said, a brow arched.

"No, not all! I'm just hoping the FBI won't stay in LA too long, was all I'm saying," Lightning countered a bit appalled by her sister's conclusions. "Something irks me when it comes to her."

"To the Agent? You know she's just doing her job right?"

"I know that but it's the way she acted," Lightning said after a sip of coffee, "something bothered me, I couldn't tell you what it was."

A short moment of silence passed as Lightning looked at her intertwined hands, Serah focusing her attention on the ceiling.

"I don't know what to do," Lightning eventually whispered to break the silence, her hands covering her face. "I always know what to do when I'm on a case, but this makes it so much complicated."

"What do you do exactly, when you're on a case?"

Glancing up, Lightning stood up and waved a hand in Serah's direction, urging her to follow her right this second. Making her way towards her office, she unlocked the door with a key she kept around her neck and pushed it open with the palm of her hand, letting Serah step inside of the room.

"I take notes. I analyze," Lightning finally answered, "I find clues, I do research."

"Clearly," Serah said as she came closer to the whiteboard. "This is the victim?"

"This is the victim six months ago," she stated before pointing at another picture, "this is her now."

"Ew, Light!"

Serah instantly turned around at the sight of the photograph of the body recovered. Gingerly observing, Lightning fought a smile at her sister's curiosity got the better of her and focused her attention back on the picture, a look of disgust still plastered on her face.

"She doesn't look anything like before," Serah observed, "Like she tried to change her identity."

"I know, and with the FBI showing up at the door, the pictures she took…I don't know, I feel like there's something more. Something they don't want us to know."

"Light, can you sit down?"

"Uh, sure?"

Arching a brow in Serah's direction, Lightning went to her chair and slowly sat down. Legs crossed, she waited for Serah to sit on the facing seat, unable to tell what had suddenly happened, and based on her shifty eyes, she figured whatever needed to be said wasn't something good.

"Serah, out with it. I don't have all day…"

"But you do," her younger sister interjected. "You're not supposed to be working today, you're supposed to be enjoying time with your family rather than concentrating your attention on a case that doesn't even belong to you anymore, Lightning." Wincing, Lightning leaned back against the chair and stapled her fingers together. "I don't know what you want to achieve with this but…stop."

"Why," she asked offended, "I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm just trying to find who did this, find the killer."

"I know Sis, but this isn't the right way. You could lose your job and I doubt this is what you want since you're…obsessed with it."

"I'm not obsessed with work, Serah. I just want it for you to be safe to walk around. You and everyone else," Lightning stated, her tone suddenly sounding more annoyed. "I don't know why this is so hard for you to understand."

"To be honest, I do understand. I just need you to be sure."

"Sure about…what, exactly?"

Serah smiled. Coming closer, she placed her mug on a coaster and elbowed against the desk before whispering; "because I'm going to help you dummy, what else are younger sister's for but to help their older ones?"


	3. Three

Sitting at her desk, Lightning wasn't looking at anything in particular. Lost in her thoughts and overwhelmed by the thousands of questions still needing to be answered, she brought her hands to her face and covered her eyes with her palms, slowly inhaling and exhaling the ambient air.

Two days had passed since Christmas had turned into her own personal nightmare, and still, Lightning was unwilling to give up the case even though it meant defying direct orders from her boss, and the FBI. But truth was, she also didn't really care. If she needed to prove to the world of her capacities as a Lieutenant, she was going to deliver with a thousand of fireworks.

Parting her fingers in front of her eyes, she glanced at the laptop as it finally chimed a bell, her research for facial recognition finally being finalized after ten long minutes of waiting in a complete and deafening silence, and with a large intake of air, Lightning gazed at her screen.

On the many security cameras she had analyzed, merely five had been able to track Jihl's movements. Usually leaving her apartment around six in the morning wearing nothing but a hoody, her trail eventually disappeared upon entering the subway never to be tracked down again. All Lightning could figure out from this was that Jihl was headed towards Pasadena, on the North East of the city but that was it. Without access the underground cameras, there was nothing more she could truly do.

Grunting to herself, she pushed the mouse away and looked up at the ceiling with a defeated look on her face. And now, the need of nicotine was being felt. Grabbing her jacket from the back of her chair, Lightning exited her office and went towards the balcony facing her office.

"Lieutenant there's been another dead body. 420 Stanley Avenue."

Stopping dead in her tracks, Lightning quickly turned around. "Same MO?"

"It would seem. What do we do?"

"We go. The FBI hasn't said anything about any other murders. Let's go."

Savagely grinning, Lightning snatched the keys from her leather jacket and stormed down the stairs of the precinct as fast as humanly possible. She got in her car at the same time Yuj pulled the passenger door open and did not wait for him to close it back to go into reverse and escape the vicinity, sirens on.

"What do we have so far," she asked with both her hands on the wheel.

"Female victim, throat slit from ear to ear. She was found ten minutes ago in a dumpster by the local garbageman."

"Ten minutes? We need to hurry."

Pressing on the pedal increasingly harder, Lightning followed Yuj's instructions to find their way as quickly as possible and during the five-minute drive it took them to arrive, all Lightning was able to do was to pray for the FBI to be far away from them, back in Quantico.

Stopping the car near the brigade of police officers positioned at the intersection, both the Lieutenant and the Detective shoved their badges in front of the security's faces and walked under the security banner, hastily walking in direction of the forensic.

"Emma? You're here?"

"Of course I am, I was only one minute away." Looking over her shoulder, Lightning then urged her for details with a warning look. "Right. This is our second Jane Doe. No papers, nothing. Throat slit, deep enough for her to…"

"Bleed in a matter of seconds."

"Exactly," Emma acknowledged with a bob of the head. "But there's more this time. Look."

Frowning, Lightning grabbed the pair of gloves Emma was handing to her and carefully looked at the wound. Something was inside of it. Though she couldn't quite tell what had been stuck inside the victim's flesh, Lightning wagered that this hadn't been left on purpose and _that_ was an additional clue.

"Yuj, give me a bag. And Tweezers. Now."

"Yes."

"What are you doing, Lightning," Emma asked with round eyes.

"I'm taking this before the FBI comes. It's a matter of seconds now."

Retrieving the piece of metal from the wound and carefully dropping it inside the plastic bag, Lightning was quick to hide it inside of Emma's bag before standing back up with her fists at her hips.

"Any witnesses?"

"No. She died two to three hours ago, around five in the morning."

"Blood trail?"

"Nothing."

"So she was killed somewhere else and dumped here like a useless piece of…well trash," Lightning concluded. "Shit."

Looking around, she walked further away from the street and checked for any tires that could've left a trace from an abrupt departing, but it was without surprise that nothing was to be found. These people, whoever killed these girls were professionals, thorough and careful about every single detail.

"We meet again. Seems like we're drawn to each other eh?"

Clenching her jaw, Lightning tried to ignore Agent Yun's annoying voice and swiftly turned around, a wicked smile on her lips. "It seems we do, Agent Yun."

"Wasn't I clear yesterday?"

"You were _very_ clear when it came to Jihl Nabaat, but as far as I'm concerned this is an entirely different case."

"I'm sure you believe it is," Agent Yun retorted with an amused yet unfriendly look in her eyes. "But once more, I'm going to ask you to leave."

"On what grounds, exactly?"

Chuckling, Agent Yun turned around and pointed at the dark SUV parked in the distance. "Because we're here, and we don't need you anymore."

It took her a few moments to realize the pain her nails had caused her from digging into the palm of her hands, her previous irritation slowly turning towards anger. "What are you going to do then, Agent Yun? Tell on me again like we're children on the school grounds because someone refused to give you candy?"

Laughing, the Agent turned back around to face her and took a step closer to stand only a few inches away from her face. "If that gets you out of my way I just might. I'd finally be able to do my job."

"That's ironic since I'm trying to do the exact same thing," Lightning countered, painfully trying to ignore the scent of Yun's perfume if perfume it even was, "and yet here you are _again,_ stealing another case from under my nose."

"I'm sure you would be much more efficient dealing with something else…" Yun suggested, "This is out of your control."

"Like hell it is,' Lightning argued, "Do you even know who I…"

"No," she coldly interjected, "and to be quite frank, I don't give a toss about who you are. To me, you're nothing but an LAPD Lieutenant. Now go, let the big guys do their job and for the last time, stay out of my way."

"Tsch."

Glaring at her, Lightning walked past her in a fury and grabbed both Emma and Yuj from the crime scene. Glancing over her shoulder, she gingerly observed as Agent Yun bent down to look at the victim, ignoring everything else around her before she left her line of sight at the corner of the alley.

"I'm going to kill her," she bitterly stated.

"Before you do that," Emma said, "let me run some DNA analysis about our young lady."

"You took a sample?"

"Saliva, fingerprints, hair. She was so focused on you I figured I'd have time to grab something."

"Thanks. But you know this goes against direct orders," Lightning asked before stopping in front of her car, giving both Emma and Yuj a worried look.

"Oh, I know. But I'm not a fan of the Feds, and this seems to be pissing them off quite nicely," Emma said through a beaming smile.

"Perfect. Do you need a ride?"

"I wouldn't mind one. I don't feel like carrying this to the precinct," she said pointing at the cooler. "A ride would be fantastic."

"Let's go, then." Turning the ignition on, Lightning drove off from the scene, sirens on and loudly echoing throughout the city. Agent Yun had started a war, and one she wasn't willing to lose.

"Well?"

"You're not familiar with patience, are you?"

Rolling her eyes to the ceiling, Lightning sluggishly sat down on Emma's chair with her arms crossed on her chest, her foot frenetically tapping against the ground. It had now been more than twenty minutes since they had made it back to the morgue, and still, nothing had come out from the samples.

"I just don't want the stupid FBI to be one step ahead of us."

"Bad experience with them?" Pulling a stool closer to her desk, Emma sat down and gave Lightning a confused look.

"Not really," Lightning admitted with a shrug, "I just don't like her. She gets under my skin."

"That much?"

"Yes. She seems to believe she owns the world because of her status and to be honest I find that pathetic."

"Well, she's a Federal Agent Lightning, she has the right to…"

"I know," she harshly interjected, "it doesn't mean I'm supposed to like it."

Silently acknowledging her words, Lightning heavily sighed and glanced back at the computer, impatiently waiting for the analysis to finish its wretched job. Slowly exhaling, she glanced at the morgue with a frown and noticed the Christmas tree Emma had placed in the left corner of the room.

Christmas had never been her scenery, or at least, it hadn't been for a long time. She didn't understand the unnecessary decorating, the trees making more of a mess than anything else, the presents needed to be exchanged all because a child was born years ago. She could see why people enjoyed this holiday, usually giving them a reason to spend time with their loved ones and enjoy a meal as well as a bottle of wine, but to Lightning, Christmas meant nothing more but a commercial Holliday making people spend more money than they already have.

"We have a match."

Looking back at the screen, Lightning was back on her feet with a smile. "Tifa Lockhart," she whispered under her breath. "Disappeared eight months ago and presumed dead. What the hell is going on?"

Taking a step back, Lightning ran her fingers through her hair and instantly felt a headache that had been threatening her ever since her eyes had flickered open. Looking through her bag, she picked out a box of pills and shoved a single white one inside of her mouth, immediately swallowing it under Emma's concerned gaze.

"Two girls. Both went missing…Nothing makes sense."

"What are you going to do?"

She shook her head and came closer to the laptop. "Go see her parents. It's the only thing I can do. If I tell them to come here, I'm dead." She sighed. "Where do they live?"

"San Francisco," Emma said after doing a few researches online.

"Call me if you get anything from the piece you found in the wound."

"Alright. Will you be okay?"

Nodding, Lightning thanked Emma with a smile and started to walk towards the exit door until her voice called out for her name. Looking over her shoulder, she waited for the forensic to speak up but after a few seconds, Emma only shook her head and allowed the Lieutenant to leave the vicinity and by extension, the city.

But first, Lightning needed a day-off and therefore a lie big enough for her to be away for at least the entire day. Walking up the stairs, she suddenly remembered her sister's kind offer to help however she could, and what was best than a sudden case of flue with a boyfriend working miles away?

Confident, she arrived on the first floor and entered the office after knocking twice, her face instantly turning to stone at the sight of Agent Yun sitting before his desk.

"Lightning could you wait a few more minutes? I'm not done with Agent Yun yet."

"Of course, Sir," Lightning uttered through gritted teeth, glaring at the woman's nape of the neck. Going backwards, she opened the door again and leaned against the wall with her arms crossed on her chest, her eyes almost powerful enough to destroy the facing wall.

Her bad-luck streak didn't seem to be coming to and end, and the only person she was able to blame was the woman sitting only a few feet away from her vicinity, at her workplace. Didn't she have a special office filled to the brim with platinum and a golden thrown for her to sit on? Did she had to come here and annoy her with her presence?

With fist clenched to their maximum, she stood back straight as the door suddenly opened and stared at Yun exiting the office with her hands down the pockets of her black jeans, black boots hitting the ground and echoing throughout the entire precinct.

She continued to follow her with her stare as she entered the elevator, and only now did they look at one another from the distance. As usual, and what seemed to be a trademark trait, Yun viciously smirked as their eyes locked and the wink she performed as the doors closed was enough to send Lightning over the edge. Fuming, she began to rush towards the stairs but was abruptly stopped by a forceful hand grabbing her by the wrist.

"Leave it, Lieutenant."

Growling to herself, she waited for the unpleasant hold to stop and turned around to face Captain Amodar but as she gazed at his features, she knew something was slightly different than before. The usual smile he wore every single day was gone and with it, the spark in his eyes.

"Sir?"

"Yes. What did you want to tell me?"

Clearing her throat, she followed the man back to his office and shut the door on her way in. Refusing to sit down, she intertwined her fingers behind her back and prayed for an authorization to leave the precinct right away. "My sister has the flue Sir, and her boyfriend is unable to cater for her. Could I have a day off to take care of her?"

Amodar scrutinized her with intensity, trying to decipher her facial expression to find a possible lie. "I guess I could allow that. You're never taking time off anyway, and I believe you have more than two weeks at your disposal. Take one day or two, we'll manage."

Finally, Lightning could breathe again. "Thank you, Sir," she said with a tight smile.

Understanding that the conversation was now over and done, Lightning made her way out of the office and into her own, picking up the few things she would need for her trip: badge, gun and papers about Jihl that could perhaps relate the two young women together and with her phone to her ear, she rushed down the stairs without a single goodbye.

Waiting for Serah to pick up her cell, the pink-haired Lieutenant was already back inside of her car and manically driving towards her house to pick up a few additional things she might need if she decided to stay longer. Annoyed by the fact Serah didn't respond, Lightning was in and out of her house within a few minutes notice, holding in her palm a bag filled with some of her belongings and already driving out of the city of angels with her sirens on.

Although not being allowed to use them for her personal gain, she also knew time was of the essence and couldn't allow herself to waste time by driving as slowly as the other cars. San Francisco was a five hour drive at a normal speed and thanks to the lights, the trip would be shortened by at least two hours.

Exiting the city and entering the highway, Lightning pressed harder on the pedal as her ringtone finally echoed inside her car.

"Serah, finally!"

 _"What is it?"_

"I need you to pretend to be sick for the next two days, I'm leaving town for a while but no time to explain. While you're at it, try to find out if anyone knew the victim, I'll send you a picture as soon as I can."

 _"Lightning this is…"_

"Madness, I know but this just got more complicated. I'll be back in two days."

 _"If I don't have any news, I'm warning the authorities you're missing,"_ Serah ground out, her displeased tone of voice impossible to ignore.

"Sure, whatever," Lightning annoyingly replied. "Got to go, I'm driving. See ya."

 _"Be caref…"_

Already hanging up the phone, Lightning orientated her car to the right side for emergencies only and was soon reaching more than 120 miles per hour.

Not once in her life had she drove so fast on the highway, or anywhere really, but consequences being Lightning had no other choice. However, driving at high speed did not mean being reckless and every time she manoeuvred the wheel was done slowly and precisely. The last thing she needed was to cause a deadly accident, and by the chance she would survive, her job would be taken away from her in the blink of an eye.

"Right," she said to herself, "Mister and Misses Lockhart. How am I even supposed to tell them? Emma sent me a picture of the body she managed to take," she continued to whisper, both hands on the wheel, "but what if they don't let me in? I can't use force, I can't even call someone for help. Is this actually a good idea?"

Slowing down, Lightning needed to carefully think about her next moves. The plan she had wanted to be perfect merely existed, and the mistakes she had made at the beginning of her career came back to her mind like an alarm. And if those mistakes had taught her anything was that rushing into something headfirst was the biggest mistake she could possibly make.

At the time, Lightning was only twenty-one years old. She had graduated from the Police Academy with highest honours and was promised to be one of the most successful detectives and for a while, what had they said had been true. But during a case involving a rape and a triple homicide, Lightning slipped up.

The victim they had found in a house had been babysitting two young children aged nine and six, and she was only seventeen. It was the first murder Lightning ever worked on and the toll it had taken on her had been more than noticeable.

Everything had been going according to her plan until the arrest of a possible murderer happened and she was in the lead. With her gun in her hand, she had entered the house as quietly as possible, her Glock47 glued to both of her hands and for a moment, she waited, listening to the sounds coming from the different rooms. With her team behind her back, she knew she was safe, but not safe enough.

After a few moments, she had drawn her breath in and walked towards the living-room, checking everywhere, every possible room and still, the man they had been looking for was nowhere to be seen and worse, he had left a note. Only a few words scribbled and left on the kitchen counter. _Next time, maybe?_ These three words began to haunt her, and soon, Lightning became obsessed with the idea of finding him.

Day and night, all Lightning did was to work, sleep put to the side. And the more she got obsessed, the more difficult it was to logically think. But nothing stopped her, and although ordered to take some time off to get a clearer head, Lightning kept thinking about it, until finally, something in her mind started to blink and without any backup, she went ahead towards an address she had previously missed.

With her gun in her hand, Lightning hadn't thought twice as she kicked down the front-door, her eyes glancing in every direction to find him, and when here eyes had finally settled on his chest, her anger had been lit like a brazier. Slow at first, and destructive at the end.

To this day, Lightning couldn't tell what made her pull the trigger after a short conversation of him only declaring victory, applauding the you detective with a wicked and cruel smile on his lips. But the longer had had applauded, and the angrier she had gotten until finally, her finger snapped. All it took was one single bullet piercing through his lung to send him to his demise and as he fell to the ground lifeless, Lightning had only stared for one, two, and three minutes.

To _this_ day, Lightning hadn't been able to tell Amodar what had happened. Exhaustion mixed with a false sense of pleasure had overwritten her mind, and more than two weeks of suspension with private therapy consultations had been put in place. Some that had luckily been able to help her.

So, what was she doing at this very second? Was she doing the same thing, obsessing over every single detail seeming different to her? Would she make the same mistakes if she continued to drive towards San Francisco or was she willing to turn around, already seeing the city in the distance? Slowly starting to slow down until she came at a stop, Lightning turned the ignition and sirens off, and rested her head against her wheel for a few minutes.

During those minutes, an equation had started to form, and Lightning's goal had been to answer it and eventually, she did. Turning the engine back on, she continued towards the city with a lighter weight pressing on her shoulder and a determined look gazing towards San Francisco.

* * *

She arrived in front of the door a little after three in the afternoon. Firstly driving to a nearest hotel, she had checked in, placed her bag in her room and eaten a few fruits she had brought with her on the trip to regain the energy she had lost by overthinking all the decisions she had taken before, and re-considering her plan on last time and at the time, it had seemed like the only thing to do.

But instead, the longer Lightning stared at the door, the harder it became to knock. But as fate would've decided, it wasn't her who made the first move and when the door opened before her eyes, she instantly lowered her hand and managed a smile.

"Oh, I'm sorry…" the woman answering the door said with a smile. Looking at her from head to toe, that smile disappeared and was replaced by fear. "The Police…Why? Did you find my Tifa? John, come here!"

"Ma'am, I'm Lieutenant Far…" Lightning tried to cut out before being interjected once more.

"Is she…alive? Is my daughter alive? Please, I beg of you!"

The few colours Lightning had on her face were drained within an instant. "Ma'am, can I please come in?"

The woman nodded, fear still showing on her face as she allowed the Lieutenant inside of her home. Cosy and warmer than needed, the house the couple occupied was a synonym of a wealthy family, and the many pictures of Tifa getting numerous rewards hanging at the walls showed a certain sense of pride. _She was smart. Just like Jihl._

Following the mother towards the living-room, Lightning flinched at the sight of a tall, large man standing near the couch, his hands clamped at his hips. The size of one was enough to cover her entire face and break her neck in a single second and despite of that, she tried to remain unfazed.

"Please sit down, can I get you anything? A tea, coffee?"

"No thank you ma'am, listen I'm here from Los Angeles and…"

"LA," a gruff, angered voice barked, "why are you from LA?"

"I'm here because the body of your daughter was found in Los Angeles earlier today," Lightning said, "I'm sorry to have to tell you this in those circumstances."

A silence settled between them all, a line separating the Lieutenant from the family. Clearing her throat, she retrieved a picture from her bag and made it slide in their direction and as always, the response was instantaneous. The sobbing sounds escaping the woman's mouth were hushed by the strong arm of the father, his grey-coloured eyes piercing through her skull.

"How? How did this happen," he asked angrily.

"She was found earlier this morning with no identification, no wallets. Her throat had been…slit."

The mother's cry echoed throughout the house as she left the room to enter another, the father keeping on starting at Lightning who anxiously started to fidget on her chair. "Slit? You're saying my little girl was murdered?"

"Yes. I'm sorry, Sir."

The man suddenly stood up and Lightning's flinch was left unseen. Following him with a concerned gaze, she waited for him to reappear from the kitchen a glass of amber liquid in his hand, and a book in another. Wiping the sweat from her hands on her jeans, she grabbed another picture from her bag and slid it next to the other one, Jihl Nabaat's body lying next to Tifa's.

"Sir, have you ever seen this woman? Did you daughter know her?"

Arching a brow, the man bent down to look at the picture and shook his head. "No."

"Are you sure? You barely…"

"I'm telling you I don't know, lady. I don't know who this kid is. Why?"

"Jihl was killed a day before your daughter, same MO. No wallet, nothing. I was hoping you'd recognize her, so I could make a connection between them both," Lightning said, another disappointment added to the list. But what bothered her more was the father's demeanour. Somehow, it didn't seem like he even cared.

The man grunted in response and with a shake of the head, he dug his nose inside the book. However, the one he was holding wasn't filled with words, but with pictures.

"My daughter was the smartest. She was about to be a doctor, you know," he said after a sip of what she now identified as scotch, "look."

Grabbing the book being handed to her, she carefully looked at the pictures and instantly, something was off. Once more, the body she had found on the street was thinner than the being presented to her, and the face had changed but just a bit. "How old are these pictures, Sir," she asked, unsure of what to conclude.

"Maybe a year. Right before she disappeared. Or left." Frowning, Lightning glanced at the picture one more time. "Oh, want something to drink?"

"A water would be fine, thank you." Watching him leave, it was quick for the Lieutenant to retrieve her cell phone and snap multiple pictures of Tifa and slide it back inside of her pocket before the father came back inside, glass in hand. "Thank you," she said once more before swallowing nearly the entire glass.

"What happens now?"

Lightning sighed. "The body will be given the SFPD." _If the FBI doesn't keep it in ice._

"And we'll have it? To burry?"

"Yes Sir, the police should retrieve it soon," she lied with a tight smile.

Unsure of what to do and see if she should stay longer in San Francisco to wait for the body, Lightning glanced at her wrist-watch and stopped a sigh from escaping her lips. One day was enough for what she wanted to do, but if necessary, she would stay in town for a few more days, hopping for a body to appear.

"I'm not going to take more of your time, Sir," she said, retrieving the two pictures. "I will call you if I find out anything else before tomorrow."

"Alright. Goodbye, Lieutenant."

Waiting for some sort of movement from him, Lightning quickly gave up as his attention got drawn back to the pictures. With a small move of the head, she turned around with her purse at her shoulder and exited the household without a single word.

For the third time in three days, she felt that something was wrong. The father was off, the weight loss situation was off and the similarities between the two girls was too much to only be coincidental. Shaking her head, she walked with a cigarette at her lips towards the hotel with a new headache buzzing at her temples. It had been three years now that migraines had started to become a nuisance, and according to her therapist, the tension in her body was the only reason why.

But as the migraines continued, she was finally able to receive some strong painkillers as well as something else to help her relax that luckily, she hadn't forgot to bring.

Entering the hotel's hall after just a few minutes, Lightning took the elevator to the fourth floor and was inside of her bedroom, already at the balcony merely seconds later and in her hand, a joint. Better than Xanax and less dangerous from the mind, Marijuana had been prescribed to her to ease her constant anxiety and help her be less tensed and although she had always been against drugs, this solution had seemed to work.

Now, her headaches weren't as strong anymore and being relaxed had helped overthink less and enjoy herself just a little bit more, but ever since Christmas, the usual pain had been back and refusing to swallow another pill, her only solution left had been weed.

Rolling a thin joint, she placed it at her lips and took two consecutive drags to help the flame work faster, she inhaled the smoke and stuck it between her lungs before immediately blowing it all away. The scent she had yet to learn to like was powerful and the white cloud that lingered over her head disappeared with the force of the wind and the taste in her mouth automatically made her wince. Even after six months, she still didn't enjoy joints but as long as they helped, it was all that mattered.

Placing it inside of the ashtray, she stood up from her chair and grabbed her laptop from the bag and her phone and brought them back outside. First sending a message to her sister and therefore reassure her of her safety, she also wrote the few details she had found from speaking to the Lockharts and had then downloaded the pictures on her laptop.

Tifa Lockhart and Jihl Nabaat were somehow connected, and the FBI had retrieved both of their bodies. The fathers seemed aggressive and not carrying at all and abuse was even mentioned. Smart girls, both went through massive physical changes…But what was missing?

Closing her eyes, Lightning leaned against the chair and with closed eyes, brought the joint back to her lips. Maybe a good night of sleep was all that she needed to her mind clear and truth was, she couldn't wait to lie down and finally get some rest.

* * *

 **Hiya :) I wanted to thank Ragnarokxiii after the end of this chapter for the kind offer. It truly made my day, you can't believe how much and I can't thank you enough but please, keep reading for free! Thank you again for you kind words, I hope you have an amazing day :)**


	4. Four

"Something is missing," Serah said from behind her back. "These girls are clearly connected but…"

"Yes, I know," Lightning stated, "problem is, the FBI is the one who knows that."

"And following them would be…"

"A crime, quite literally."

Swallowing a few mouthfuls of water, Lightning tossed the empty bottle of plastic towards the bin, missing by only a few inches. With a grunt, she marched towards the bottle and carefully placed it inside, joining the many papers that had started to fill it.

She hadn't been able to learn anything new during her two-day stay in Frisco, and the body the FBI had recovered had been given to the SFPD, but no matter how much she had tried to argue, access to it had been prohibited as well as seeing the parents. Luckily, the few intel she had gathered had been able to form a new clue and trusting her gut had truly been the right solution.

"Well in any case, I better get to the station. Stay here if you want, you have the keys anyway," Lightning said after picking up her things and placing them in her bag, gun near her belt. "I'll see you later."

"Don't work too hard," Serah jokingly teased.

Ignoring the comment, she went out of her house and behind her wheel hastily. Going into reverse, she went down the road with her brows slightly burrowed and took more than a few turns to realize the car following her from the distance, and the shape and colour of the truck made her implode.

Pressing on the gas, she rolled down the streets like a maniac with her sirens on and reached the precinct with the mindset of murder. Staring at the distance, she spotted the SUV slowly driving in front of the building before driving away. Certain Agent Yun was either driving on being on the passenger side, her teeth turned to ash the harder she pressed them together.

She only hoped someone would be waiting for her with a case to distract her from everything else going on. With that in mind, she got up to the first floor and was immediately greeted by Yuj, file in hand.

"Good to see you Lt, your sister okay?"

"Yes she's fine, a lot better. Is that a case?".

"Yeah, robbery. Thirty thousand dollars' worth of gold."

"Big boys," Lightning dryly said, "any leads?"

"Maqui's talking to some neighbours, he should be back soon." They both stopped at her office door, Yuj's eyes hiding something. "Check on your desk. Emma left you something."

Intrigued, Lightning opened the door and carefully shut it back. Flicking the lights on, it took the bulb a few seconds to be brought back to life, the small flicker continuing for the next few seconds and finally able to see, Lightning strode in direction of her desk, her left brow standing a few degrees higher.

Looking through her papers, she was quick to find the scribbled message hidden between two files and the longer she stared at it, the bigger her smile became. Somehow, Emma had managed to find Jihl's previous line of work, waitressing in a bar called _The Epiphany._ It was located in the south of West-Hollywood and was an LGBTQ+ kind of establishment and already, the plan of paying a visit to the manager later during her day was already in motion.

But for now, she had another focus in mind; to do her actual job. For some reason, her leave of absence had made her feel like a slacker, and the feeling it had given had been less but pleasing. Putting the paper in her pocket, she made her way back to Yuj and waited with him for Maqui to return.

"Everything good?"

"Yes, Detective, everything is good." Glancing at the elevator as the bell chimed, disappointment washed over her. "When did Maqui leave?"

"An hour ago, something like that. But check this out," Yuj said, turning his chair around, "video footage from the robbery."

"Alright."

Leaning closer to the screen, she gazed at the video footage, unsurprised by the chain of events that occurred. The three-armed individuals had entered the place with masks and in less than two minutes, had managed to go out before the police could arrive.

"I'm going to go to the crime scene. Care to join?"

Yuj nodded and turned the laptop off. "Sure thing, let's go."

 _Whatever keeps me occupied,_ she thought, walking down the stairs _let's pray to God they won't follow me again. Or you know what, let them. Maybe they'll understand I stopped working on the case, or more accurately, believe_. With a smile crinkling the corner of her lip, Lightning reached for her car and left the vicinity along with Yuj.

"So Boss… Where were you, really?"

"Hm?"

"I know Serah wasn't sick, Snow is one of my best friends."

"Right," Lightning spoke out, "I forgot."

"Were you in San Francisco?"

Arching a brow, Lightning kept her eyes on the road. "How'd you know?"

"Emma told me the victim was from there and with you being gone, I figured you'd go to see her folks. Was I right?"

She nibbled on her lip for a short time, trying to figure out her options. Should she lie to Yuj and risk for their work relationship to deteriorate?

"You were. But Yuj, you can't get involved."

"But I want to…"

"No. Don't worry, I can do this alone. If we all start to work on it secretly, Amodar is going to figure it out and fire all of us, not only me. You can't let anything show and you certainly cannot help me. Clear?"

"But Lightning…"

"It's final," she ground out, "and that's an order."

Casting a glance in his direction, Yuj eventually dropped the matter. Though looking seemingly displeased, Lightning knew she had made the right decision. He was aware of the facts but couldn't in any way participate in whatever she had in mind.

Suddenly remembering her situation, she looked up at the rear-view mirror and checked for any suspicious car trailing her but was relieved to notice the FBI had decided to let it go, at least for now. _I wonder…Will there be another murder or were two enough? I feel like the saying never thrice without twice seems to fit perfectly to the situation… Let's hope I'm wrong this time._

"Here turn left and we'll be there."

Doing just so, Lightning parked the car in front of the store but didn't immediately get out of it. Closing her eyes, she brought her fingers to the bridge of her nose and massaged the spot to erase the pain already building up inside of her head.

"You okay Boss?"

"I'm…Fine. Just a little light-headed." Opening her eyes, she gave Yuj a reassuring glance and got out of her vehicle, badge in hand.

Showing it to the officer standing guard, she was allowed inside of the place that had been left in a ruckus. Pieces of glass and jewelry were all over the ground, covering nearly her entire vicinity. Truth be told, this was a mess. The robbers might've been prepared for the police, but they clearly had been through panic once inside of the store and what proved it was the superb piece of jewelry that had been left untouched

With that alone, more than fifty thousand dollars would have been stolen instead of the ten thousand they had managed to get away with. Impressive, sure, but not being done by the hands of a professional. They would've targeted the piece of the highest value instead of focusing smaller ones unless… _Unless that's what they wanted for me to assume._

Shaking her head, Lightning tried to get her thoughts of conspiracy away from her thoughts. "Did they pull the trigger?"

"I don't think so, but it's possible."

"Look for a case somewhere, it could lead us to a gun owner."

"Sure thing!"

Going behind the counter, Yuj disappeared as he kneeled to the ground, leaving Lightning to look at the extent of the damage caused and getting closer to counter she continued to think. Running her hands through her hair, she kept a few strands between her fingertips and rubbed them together, her eyes focusing on nothing but the void.

Jihl Nabaat's parents had left the city a day ago when finally, the FBI had given them the body back, a body _they_ had stolen from the precinct. _Or she stole_ , she morosely thought.

"Found anything," she asked at the sight of Yuj standing back on his feet.

"No. Maybe Emma could tell us something…"

 _Emma! Shit, I have to go see her without Yuj. I forgot about the text she sent me about the piece found in Tifa's throat_. Looking around, she and Yuj continued to investigate for the next thirty minutes and got back to the station as empty-handed as when they had arrived.

Immediately going downstairs under Yuj's suspicious gaze she quickly managed to forget about, Lightning got the sublevel around noon and was surprised to find the morgue completely empty. Looking on both her sides, she decided to wait in front of the room with her back against the wall, arms crossed on her chest.

Glancing at her wristwatch, Lightning found herself surprised as minutes kept passing by, Emma still being MIA. In the five years they had worked together, not once had she decided to eat elsewhere than underground, surrounded by corpses, and the sudden change puzzled Lightning to a new level.

However, about to give up and go back to her office, the bathroom door was pulled open and a sniffling noise dangerously made its way to her ears. Frozen in place, Lightning wanted to run away and avoid the coming interaction; tears and such weren't something up her alley or something she enjoyed.

Gazing at Emma standing at the other end of the hallway, they both exchanged a curious look in each other's direction and the closer she got, the tenser Lightning turned out to be.

"Lightning? What are you doing here," Emma asked, her eyes red-rimmed and nose still slightly humid.

"I'm here because of your text. I forgot to come and see you first thing this morning."

"Oh, right. Come on in."

With a nod, she followed Emma inside of the room and thanked the God she didn't believe in to have avoided her the unpleasant action of having to listen to someone complain and try to console them. She wasn't here as a therapist or even a friend. She was here to get answers and nothing more.

"How was Frisco?"

"Disappointing. I wish I could've found out more. I did find some things but not enough."

"Maybe this will help."

Pressing on a few keys, Emma loaded a page as Lightning took a seat at the desk, her eyes glued to the screen. Waiting for the download to take effect, she crossed her fingers and hoped for good news.

She, however, frowned as the document finally appeared and gave Emma a questioning look. "Is this…?"

"It is. That's what killed your girl this time."

"So the throat sliced was just for show?"

Emma shrugged and sighed. "Doubtful, but the Botulinum toxin didn't help her case. Without a body, I can't say more."

"Yeah, I bet you can't." Closing her eyes, Lightning elbows against her knees and rubbed her face with her hands. This would never end. "I don't know what to do about this case. The more I discover the more complicated it gets."

"I know, I thought the same thing." They looked at the screen in silence, reading once more the details of the find. "Oh, by the way, did you get my message?"

"Yes. I'm going to the bar tonight, see what I can find out about Jihl. Maybe they'll be able to give me a name she truly used rather than aliases."

"Let's hope so," Emma whispered under her breath.

Looking up, Lightning frowned for a couple of seconds before getting up from the seat, her eyes back on the screen.

"Can you send me this on my personal e-mail?"

"Sure thing."

"Thanks, Emma. I'll see you later."

Faking a smile and unsuccessfully doing so, the Lieutenant was out of the morgue and back inside her office in a moment's notice, already typing on her keyboard as fast as possible.

Entering her password, she waited for Emma's e-mail to arrive and double clicked on the link as it blinked on her screen. There wasn't any more information than the one she had already received, but this email could soon come in handy. How, she wasn't sure yet, but it wasn't for nothing that this had been left here.

Like a message, she asked herself, a pen between her lips, or just recklessness? Doesn't seem like these people would make mistakes.

But sadly, she couldn't be sure of that. She could be sure of nothing and this fact was slowly driving her insane. Maybe she was obsessed with the case after all, and maybe was she making a mistake to try and figure it out, but with so many doors still closed, Lightning wanted to open just one other. And maybe this one would finally give her the answers she desperately wanted.

* * *

She stood in front of the establishment for a little while, scrutinizing her vicinity with a cigarette tucked at her lips. In the middle of the gay area of Los Angeles, Lightning felt both at ease and uncomfortable. At ease, because she identified as a homosexual but uncomfortable because of how she perceived relationships: useless and unappealing. Therefore, watching all the couples walk down, hand in hand and kissing had made her felt uneasy, and for once, she hadn't been able to look at either of them.

Also, the fact to enter a bar put her outside of her comfort zone. Bars, pubs, and whatnot had never been her scenery. Usually filled with people drinking until the sun goes up and shamelessly flirting with every person finding themselves single in an ocean of sharks, there wasn't a thing Lightning enjoyed about having a night out. But to be fair, it wasn't like anyone ever invited her to have a drink, so luckily, she was saved from these places. Except for today.

Breathing out a long and deep sigh of distress, Lightning puffed on her cigarette once more and got closer to the entrance of the Epiphany, scouting for an ashtray that had been left on the outside tables and finding one, she stubbed the nicotine stick and entered the establishment without giving the doors a single touch.

Just as she remembered from these places -before, at tim where her sister forced her to go out and have fun-, the heat was astonishing but to her greatest surprise, the place wasn't fillethe d to brim. Only a few tables were occupied, and two other persons were sat at the counter, silently drinking their glass and waiting for the night to properly start. Going at seven at night had been a good all, and Lighting thanked her instincts for having decided to go early.

Listening to the music she didn't thoroughly enjoyed, the Lieutenant walked towards the bar and crossed eyes with the bartender who immediately, grinned at the sight of a newcomer. The smile, however, wasn't returned.

"Never seen you around before. You're not lost, are you?"

"Not lost no," Lightning said with a frown, "I'm just looking for someone. She works here."

"Oh?" Looking seemingly intrigued, the bartender placed the glass and towel to the side and elbowed against the counter, her hazel eyes staring right at her.

Trying to keep her vision up and not focused on the insanely large cleavage presented before her very eyes, Lightning darted away. "Blond hair, glasses? Thin, muscular and rather pretty," she said with a tight smile and looking back at the woman, she knew the answer she wanted was seconds away.

"You're talking about Melissa…I'm sorry she erm, she passed away a few days ago."

Fainting surprise, Lightning lowered her eyes and stared at the counter for a few seconds. A first name wouldn't be enough. "I didn't even know her name. Melissa, is that right?"

"Yeah, Melissa Harmony. How did you know her?"

Taken aback by the question, Lightning hadn't thought about an answer. To be fair, she hadn't thought that far along, thinking no one would be able to give her a name or even acknowledge her presence. But if Lightning had been taught something during her years of investigating, it was how to sell a lie.

"We ran into each other a few nights ago. She was coming home, and I was tipsy, trying to find my own way home. She led me back and we chatted a bit, but I never got a name."

"Yeah, she was always trying to help others." Glancing over her shoulder, the bartender focused her attention on the glasses and faced her again. "Let me give you a drink, on the house."

"Oh no please, I couldn't…"

"Too late. In Melissa's memory."

Forced to accept the offer, Lightning nodded ever so slightly and watched as she disappeared on the let side of the bar to pick out a few bottles of strong alcohol. Suppressing a sigh at the sight of vodka, an alcohol she detested, Lightning was suddenly invaded by the scent of a perfume and for a moment, she wasn't able to remember when she had been able to smell it. But as a dry laugh reached her ears, Lightning knew to who it belonged.

Slowly turning around on the stool, she dug her stare as Agent Yun pushed a few strands of brown-purplish away from her face to reveal an earring at her left ear resembling the tooth of a shark, something mostly worn by surfers or complete idiots. Strangely, when it came to this woman, the latter seemed to be a more appropriate reason.

They didn't exchange a single word for the few first seconds, only judging and staring at their respective outfits, Lightning finding herself intrigued by the low-cut t-shirt and pair of skinny blue jeans the Agent had decided to wear. Clearly, the woman was off-duty and had therefore no right to pester her about the reason of her presence in this particular bar. And what was she doing in this bar anyway?

"There's no end to you, is there," she eventually asked, her eyes darting at the bar. "I believe this is for you?"

Turning back around, Lightning stared at the pink-coloured drink that had been placed before her eyes. "I figured I'd make something matching your hair," the bartender said. "Oh, Fang! The usual?"

"Yeah, thanks Abby."

Shivering as Agent Yun -apparently called Fang- sat down to her left, Lightning wondered what she had done to be cursed with such bad luck. "What are you doing here, Lt," Fang asked after a while, the thickness of her accent only now echoing inside of her mind, "I didn't picture you as the going-to-a-gay-bar type of girl. Or any bar at all, to be honest."

"What I do during my free time is none of your concern."

Grabbing the glass from the sticky counter, Lightning first looked at the coloured content with a frown and instinctively sniffed it. Surprisingly, the smell of vodka had faded only to be replaced by an insane amount of sugar. Diabetes, here I come, she thought after taking a first sip. Opening her eyes, she was pleasantly welcomed by a fresh taste, the sugar she had smelt merely being felt as the liquid ran down the length of her throat.

Looking back to the bartender, Lightning said, "It's really good. Thanks."

"You're very welcome. It helps that you're pretty, with that don't talk to me look. I like it."

As the bartender winked and went away to tend to other customers, Lightning felt like her face was ablaze. Not necessarily shy and rather confident with her looks, receiving good-hearted compliments had always made her feel nervous, and her face always reflected her uneasiness.

Looking at her glass and waiting for her usual white complexion to come back, she glanced for a quarter of her second to her left, noticing Agent Yun's thin fingers running around the edge of her glass, the few bracelets covering her arms clicking together to produce a soothing sound.

"Why are you here, Farron?"

 _Farron, that's new_ she thought glancing up from the glass. "Having a drink," she mumbled under her breath.

"Good, so am I."

"And I should care why?"

"Here I thought you were a human being under the Lieutenant mask. Seems like it's not just a mask, eh?"

Fang winked, and Lightning nostrils flared in return. Even out of her FBI suit, the woman was still unbearable and the urge to throw her fist against her jaw was pleasingly enticing.

"Seriously? You can't just be cool and relax for a while?"

"I am cool, and I am relaxing. It's your presence that irks me."

"Irks you, eh," Fang said amusingly.

"It means _annoy_ in case you were wondering," Lightning taunted, her smile evilly growing.

"Oh burn, someone call the hospital I think I've been scorched," Fang loudly said, a few eyes now staring at them both. "Grow up Farron, it was nothing personal."

"You _made_ it personal by calling my superior."

"Like you wouldn't have done that?"

Slightly parting to reply, Lightning immediately shut her mouth back. Though refusing to admit it to her face, Yun was right. She would've done more than only give her boss a call to inform her of the situation. After all, trespassing was a crime punishable by the law, so why wouldn't had she?

"Glad to see we agree," Fang pursued, a proud smile glued to her lips. "So why don't we just forget about that and be adults about the situation?"

"Fine," Lightning bitterly spat out, "Fine."

"Terrific! So, Lieutenant Farron, what's the name behind this annoyed, angered look?"

Frowning until her forehead creased, Lightning sighed and brought her glass to her lips. Drinking two consecutive sips to finish the content as soon as possible so she could finally leave this place, she then looked back at Fang with a severe look in her eyes. "Lightning," she articulated through gritted teeth, "Lieutenant Lightning Farron."

"Fang Oerba Yun."

"Pleasure," Lightning said. Drinking another sip from her drink, she then placed it back on the counter, ready to escape.

Before she could so, the bartender reappeared from nowhere with a grin on her face, her eyes sparkling at the sight of the glass now standing empty on the counter. "I'm so glad you liked it! Do you want another? Half-price, I promise," the young woman said with a wink.

"Give her another one, I'm buying."

Staring at agent Yun, Lightning's fists suddenly clenched and the bigger her smile turned out to be, the angrier Lightning became.

"You're not the Boss of me Yun, don't forget that."

There was a feeling that went across Fang's face, but Lightning couldn't possibly figure out what it was. "Could we meet in the middle, Lightning? This is getting tedious."

Actually, agreeing with Fang, Lightning blew out a breath and sat down on the stool, her jacket coming off of her shoulders. "Fine, but it doesn't mean I'm looking for a chat," she warned her with a single look.

Lifting both of her hands as a sign of surrendering, Fang chuckled to herself and continued quietly drinking her glass of whiskey. The smile she had on her face did not leave her a single time and the creases forming around the corner of her eyes as she conversed with the bartender instantly showed. There was no doubt that this woman seemed like someone nice and pleasant, but Lightning was unable to look over the fact she had double-crossed her. It was petty, and the thought of it disgusted her, but there was nothing she could about it.

"You're angrily staring at me, Farron."

"Hm?" Blinking once or twice, it took Lightning a few moments to understand she had been staring at her for God knew how long.

"You're still investigating, uh?"

"What?"

"The case. I know you were in San Francisco to meet Tifa's parents and you're here because of Jihl Nabaat. Or are you going to continue to pretend like _you were here by chance_?"

"Would it change anything, no matter what I could tell you," Lightning asked after thanking the bartender for the drink.

"No, not really. I figured you'd be stubborn, but this is another level."

"I'm not stubborn," Lightning countered, "I don't give up, it's different."

"Whatever you want to call it Sunshine."

"Don't nickname me. We're not friends, merely acquaintances," Lightning ground out, her eyes piercing through Fang's skull who rolled her eyes in response. "Why is the FBI here?"

"Nice try," Fang offered with a shake of the head, "It's confidential."

"What's the link I'm missing between you and these girls? And why would they be described as missing, only two months apart…"

The sound of her work-ringtone suddenly rang from her pocket. Quickly retrieving it, she pressed on a _nswer_ and waited for Yuj to utter a word.

"New body, happened half-an-hour ago."

"Where," she urged him, dropping a ten-dollar bill on the counter for the glass.

"Plummer Park, East of the neighborhood."

Hanging up, she gave Fang a grin and rushed out of the establishment, her car-keys already jangling in her hand. Unlocking her car from the distance, she sat down behind the wheel and made sure Agent Yun hadn't yet left the establishment before turning the engine on, a smile spreading on her lips as no one escape through the front-door. Going into reverse, she left her parking-spot and went in direction of the park, on the other side of the bar.

Turning her lights and sirens on when the bar was not longer in her line of sight, Lightning quickly drove towards the scene of a new crime and one she knew would ultimately be related to the others and having received the call before Agent Yun, Lightning knew she'd have a few minutes to spare to quickly investigate and snatch her prints, hair and saliva for a thorough analysis.

Speeding just a bit more, she reached the park a few moments later, surprised by the lack of officers investigating the scene. Furrowing her brows, she got out of the car and jogged towards the banner, grabbing her flashlight from her inner pocket to guide her steps through the trees.

Finally being able to see the body surrounded by Yuj, Emma and Maqui, she advanced in their direction but was abruptly stopped dead in her tracks as she perceived Agent Yun approaching her team with her arms crossed on her chest and smiled as their gazes met.

"Lieutenant Farron, did you really think you'd get here before me?"

 _How the fuck_ , she thought walking closer to her. "I can't believe this."

"Believe it. You know the drill now, don't you?"

Growling, Lightning gave her team a warning look and neither of them dared move a finger. Emma was the first to react, continuing her DNA retrieval and therefore ignoring direct orders from a superior officer but once again, Fang's attention wasn't drawn to her.

Staring at one another, Lightning took a few steps closer until it was her time to put her face inches away from hers, the scent of scotch and vodka colliding between the space kept between their mouths. How much she wanted to pummel the woman into a pile of lard was enticing and slightly arousing, but also wouldn't be efficient in any way.

"You've got to be kidding me," Lightning whispered, the frown she had on getting increasingly more pronounced. "I'm not leaving, Agent Yun."

"Listen, Lieutenant Farron. I've been nice before, but this is getting too much. I will give you ten seconds to turn around, get into your car and leave. Go back to the bar, I'm sure you can get another free drink!'

"Fuck you, Agent Yun," she barked, "I'm offering my help to you, willingly and you keep fucking with me."

"I'm doing my job, Lieutenant. I know you believe that treating these crimes is somehow yours but stop dreaming. Stick to your position. You're not FBI, I am."

"You were the one saying we should meet in the middle. I'm in it, where the heck are _you_?"

"Three steps ahead of you Farron, and I always will be."

With the mindset of murder dawning on her mind, Lightning thought of pulling her gun and shoot one of her knees to see her crawl before her eyes but with her courage in hand, managed to turn around and storm out of the Park. A few objects on the ground were kicked away, and the tears of rage that had started to fill her eyes threatened to be shed as she entered her car.

The wheel she held was about to meet his maker, and after punching it more than ten times in a row, the pain spreading in her knuckles was undeniable. Clenching her fist, she brought it closer to the car window and gazed at the few drops of blood that had started to form from the friction with the leather, an unpleasant sensation of burn going up and down her four fingers.

Staring at the road with an equal amount of rage, Lightning turned the keys inside of the ignition and left the area with her sirens on once more. The alcohol she had ingested had already faded, and the dire need for a glass of wine had started to increase the amount of saliva in her mouth.

On her way home, she only hoped Emma had been able to gather evidence from the victim. If not, the chase would ultimately come to an end and that, Lightning was unable to condone.

* * *

It was a little after eleven at night when Lightning wandered out of her office with her loaded gun in her hand as quietly as possible towards the front-door. Concerned by the lateness, the possibility of an intruder trying to sneak inside and steal some of her belongings was ringing alarms inside of her mind and the closer she got to the door, the faster her heart started to beat.

Glancing inside the peep-hole she had installed during the summer, Lightning's eyebrows quirked up a few inches higher at the sight of Agent Yun standing still behind the door. From there, all she could see was the shape of an object in her hand without being able to determine what on Earth it could've been.

Hesitant, she looked down at her feet and waited. Another set of knocks immediately followed, her first and last name being called out by Fang's deep voice but still, Lightning was unsure of how to proceed. Although curiosity made her wonder why the Agent had decided to come by and pay her a visit, her resentment and hatred towards the woman was such that she also didn't care, and for a few moments, the rivalry between the two parts of her annoyingly thick head battled to the death.

"I can see your shadow from under the door Farron, don't be stubborn and let me in."

Glancing at her feet, Lightning pondered the veracity of her words but eventually put her pride away. Unlocking the door, she partly pulled it until the chain stopped it from opening all the way. "What do you want, Agent?"

"To talk. You won't get another chance, I'm already breaking every rule by coming here," Fang grumbled.

Arching her brow, Lightning closed the door, undid the chain and opened it back up, letting Fang find her own way towards the living-room where she took a seat. Waiting for the woman to join with her, Lightning poured herself a glass of wine from the bottle she had left on her coffee table, displeased by the sudden invasion of her privacy.

"Cute house. Doesn't really match the person."

"You don't know anything about me, Agent Yun, I suggest you stop supposing anything," Lightning mirthlessly spoke out, her thoughts returning to carnage in an instant. "Now, why are you here, and what do you want?"

Glancing up from her glass, she carefully observed as Fang ran her hand through her hair looking seemingly annoyed. Walking back and forth in front of the fireplace, it seemed liked the words refused to escape her lips, looking as they parted and were shut back the very next second. Finally, she decided to sit on an arm chair and let out a loud sigh, her eyes darting at the ceiling.

"I think you might be able to help me. But Lightning," Fang warned as she spotted the fire in Lightning's eyes. "This is dangerous, and confidential. I need to trust you. Can I?"

* * *

 **Hiya! I hope you guys enjoy this so far :) Tell me if something displeases you, or could've been added! Also, I just realized I had made some spelling errors before and I'd like to apologize! English isn't my first language so this could happen in the future or even now!**

 **Have a nice day!**


	5. Five

Standing in front of the white-board, Lightning was waiting for Fang to check out every single detail she had gathered and had only now realized the critical error she had committed; the file on the botulinum found in the wound she had printed and attached next to the pictures. _Great start of showing she can trust you_ , she bitterly condemned herself. _Damn it. Damn. It._

"It's what I thought," Fang said as she pointed at the exact same paper she had been thinking off. Turning around she said, "we found botulinum in Tifa's body too, good to know I was right when I said the blade was covered with it and that it should've been in the wound, but it had magically disappeared."

Biting the inside of her jaw, Lightning nodded. "Yeah, that's my doing."

"Oh, I wasn't suggesting anyone else," Fang said with a shake of the head, an amused smile on her lips. "You've done some good work based on the few details you knew. Well done."

"Thanks, I guess," Lightning mumbled. Flattery wasn't going to work. If Fang needed her help, becoming friends wasn't on her to-do list. She couldn't care less about being in her top-five favourite. "Let's go back to the living-room. I showed you that you could trust me."

"This is merely enough for me to trust you, Farron. Do you think it would be that easy?"

"And how are you planning on getting my trust?"

"I'm going to ask you questions, and to each one, I'll want an honest answer. I know you're a good liar and I've seen it first-hand earlier today, but this won't work with me. Clear?"

Looking appalled as Fang took a seat at the dining table, on the west side of the house, Lightning was left with no other choice but to give in. Running a hand through her hair, she first went towards the kitchen and discretely brought a pain-killer to her mouth, helping it to slide down her throat with a glass of tap-water before walking back towards the dining room with a bottle of sparkling water and two glasses.

Although her attachment to this woman was poor, if not non-existent, Lightning had been raised to be polite every time someone entered her house and offering a glass of water was the least she could do. It didn't show her she cared but that she was simply being a good host.

"Thanks," Fang said as Lightning took a seat at the other end of the five feet table. "Twenty questions and we're good."

"And this will prove that you can trust me?"

"Oh, believe me," Fang whispered, "it will."

Fidgeting on her seat, Lightning brought her glass of water to her lips and swallowed its content. Hoping the pain already pressing behind her eye would not turn into a migraine she clearly did not need, Lightning cracked her neck and brought her intertwined fingers to the table, her spine standing straight.

Observing as Fang retrieved a recorded, the questioning look she threw in her direction wasn't met with an answer but with a pleased smile. Fang could see the stress already pressing against her shoulder as well as the sword of Damocles getting ready to pierce through her skull , and she was having a tremendous time with it.

"State your full name, age and origins please?"

"Lightning Claire Farron, twenty-six and Canadian."

Fang lifted her head up from her papers and gave Lightning a dismayed look. Whether it was towards her age or birth country didn't matter, but the reaction it created was more than pleasing. "Do you use drugs as a recreational matter?"

"No," Lightning said. It was the truth. Smoking weed wasn't a hazardous activity, but a medical one.

"We said no lies," Fang said with a frown.

"I have a prescription for it," Lightning countered, "there's nothing enjoyable in smoking them."

"Alright…Are you on any other medication then?"

"Naratriptan," she admitted, "it's a treatment to prevent or stop migraines."

"Very well."

Marking a time to drink from her glass, Lightning was quick to mimic her. Her saliva had vanished from her mouth due to the stress that continued to pile on. Being the first time Lightning was ever interrogated, the fact that Fang was a member of the Federal Bureau did not help to ease her mind.

"How is your family situation?"

Lightning frowned. "I have a younger sister. That's it."

"Have you ever used force while being on duty?"

"Yes."

"Did you ever defensively pull the trigger and shot down an assailant?"

"Yes," Lightning repeated. Tearing her eyes away from the papers once more, Fang stared at her for what felt like an eternity.

"Have you ever stolen evidence during an on-going case?"

"What? I would never…" Growling, Lightning shook her head but never gazed away from Fang. "Yes."

"Have you given information about the case to anyone?"

Closing her eyes, Lightning brought her fingers to the bridge of her nose and squeezed her skin. "Yes," she whispered.

Fang sighed in return and threw her a disappointed look. "Very well. Why did you decide to join the LAPD?"

Opening up one eye, Lightning cocked her head to the side at the odd question. The reason why, although personal, didn't matter in her choice for a career. But bound to a no-lying rule, it was reluctantly that Lightning agreed to share that part of her life.

"My parents were killed. Hit and run, five years ago. I was already at the academy at the time but the fact the killer was never found made want to do more. No one deserves to see their loved ones murdered and never avenged," Lightning answered, "That's why I decided to join."

"Alright. Could you be able to lie to your friends, family for your job even though it would mean staining your relationship with them?"

About to answer, Lightning lifted a finger up in the air to demand for more reflexion. Although it seemed an obvious solution, to know her relationship with Serah could be affected by anything she might learn today terrified her to her very core. She had worked so hard to keep their sisterhood as it used to be, being an actor in its destruction was something she refused to see happen.

But right now, Lightning was met with yet another choice as if the previous one she had to make hadn't had a big of a consequence enough.

Blowing out a breath, she faintly nodded and looked back at Fang. "Yes, I would," she said confidently. Noticing Fang wanted to hear it another time, Lightning repeated "I would" once more and continued on with the questions.

It took them more than half-an-hour to be done with the questions until ultimately, they reached number twenty. Most of them had been about her record and her willingness to harm, manipulate and disappear for a few days without letting anyone know why nor where, and the more questions Fang had asked, the more intrigued Lightning had turned out to be but at the same time, a sense of fear had started to settle in.

"Alright, last question", Fang said after taking another sip of water, the bottle now nearly empty, "Are you a vegan?"

Perplexed by the question, Lightning's face was enough to show her consternation. "Sorry?"

"Are you a vegan?"

"Uh, no, I'm not."

"Good," Fang said through a smirk, "You can't trust vegans."

Noticing the use of humour in this situation, Lightning remained unfazed. "Alright, so? Can you trust me?"

Fang put an end to the recording and darted up from her papers with a grin. Standing up, Lightning followed her towards the living-room but walked inside the kitchen to retrieve a fresh beer from the freezer, and after an intense reflection, decided to grab another one for her guest who slowly began to be welcomed and the mere thought of it sent Lightning shivers up and down her spine.

"This is just the beginning, Lightning," Fang stated as she wandered inside the living-room, the two beers in hand. "I know _of_ you, but I don't _know_ you."

"You asked me deeply private questions, Agent Yun, I believe my answers were proof enough of my honesty," she pointed out angrily.

"Oh yes, I'm not questioning your honesty at all. Being truthful and honest does not mean the same thing to me."

"Please, share why you believe there is a difference."

Snickering, Fang grabbed the bottle of beer from the table and managed to take off the cap without the need of any tools or even a lighter. Feeling weaker, Lightning frowned and tried to do the same but the pain in her left hand was too much for her to continue.

"What happened to your hand," Fang quizzically asked.

"Nothing," Lightning said whilst grabbing the bottle opener, "nothing to be worried about."

"Should I count anger issues to the list," Fang asked through a smirk to which Lightning scowled in return. "So…yes?"

"Listen, I'm not here to play games with you. As you said, you're here for a reason and based on the dossier on the table I guess it's about the ongoing case. So why don't we stay focused on that?"

"Very well." Grabbing the dossier from the table, Fang first looked through the pages. After a little while, she grabbed one and handed it to her without a smile on her face. "This is Kelly. She was killed a year ago in Washington, throat sliced from ear to ear. She was one of us, an agent posing as a waitress and ended up killed," Fang said, pain obvious on her face. "It's when they started a war on us. The following months, we began to pick informants, Jihl and Tifa being amongst them. They were both from abusive homes and didn't hesitate to say yes."

"But why in Los Angeles? Why not Washington where it began," Lightning asked after a sip of beer. Glancing at Fang, she got up from the sofa and grabbed her packet of cigarette from her jacket she had left on the hanger and came back with on already burning between her lips.

"Because Washington was a mistake we made. Kelly should've never been caught but we slipped up and we lost one of our best agents," Fang said.

Looking at her, Lightning realized the pain she was trying to hide at the mention of Kelly. There was no doubt they used to be close and her loss still hurt her to this day.

"Was she close to you?"

"That's personal."

"So, you're allowed to ask questions but I'm not," Lightning asked.

"That's right. I'm giving you the chance to help me but as you said, that doesn't mean we're friends."

"Tsch."

Fang proudly grinned at the reaction she had managed to trigger, and Lightning pictured once more the idea of pummelling her into the ground until no one would be able to identify her. Clenching her fists and darting away, she stared at the ground for a few seconds whilst simultaneously inhaling and exhaling to regain a proper sense of calm. Grabbing her beer, she proceeded by licking her lips and glancing back at Fang whose smile had now been erased.

"Lightning, this case is dangerous, and I don't think you're ready for that."

"What, because I'm _just_ a Lieutenant?

"No, because God knows I want it to end. Are you sure you want to see it start?"

Lightning was taken aback by her words and based on the despair that had washed over her face, it seemed clear she wasn't lying. Would she even be able to help as much as she wished? They were all FBI agents after all and surely had a better understanding of the case, one she never would possess. Or could she? She knew she could, or believed she could, but what if she turned out to be wrong?

Running her hand in her hair, she glanced at the dossier that had remained untouched and back at Fang. The look on her face was taken over by distress, but there was something…strange about it. And when it hit her, it was all Lightning could do but to glare.

"You're lying. You don't hate this case."

"What makes you say that?"

"Your face. I can see you're lying."

Her distress stayed but only for a few seconds. Quickly, she turned her frown upside down and replaced her straight mouth for a smirk. "Well done.

"Was this one of your precious tests again?"

"There's no fooling you, is there?"

Feeling as if her face had been covered with lava, Lightning stood up from the couch and aggressively pointed towards the door.

"If you're here to make fun of me, or whatever, you can leave, Agent. I'm not interested in playing games."

"Neither am I, Lightning."

"Then what's with the incessant jokes?"

"Listen to me. Everything I said about it being dangerous isn't a lie. You're LAPD, I shouldn't even be talking to you about this. Do you know how many rules I'm breaking just by doing this?" Lightning shook her head and darted down. "I need to know, to be sure there's nothing you're hiding, that could endanger not only the case but also our careers."

"I know but…"

"No, you don't." Coming closer, Fang whispered "You don't know shit. And don't think you'll get any praise for it. See this as…volunteering. If I don't decide to change my mind and make sure you lose your job."

Biting the inside of her jaw, Lightning had no right to say anything in return. But how she wanted to retort with a witty reply to bring her down to her knees. "Fine."

"If you're as accommodating the rest of the way we'll get along very well."

"Ha-ha."

Crossing her arms on her chest, she brought her cigarette still burning between her fingers to her lips and inhaled the smoke. She kept it between her lungs, staring at Fang still closely standing before her. And the entire time, all Lightning could do was to stare at her eyes.

She didn't know if the lights had turned them greener, but to look at them so closely and for such a long time had changed them in a way she couldn't quite figure out. Perhaps was it because of their powerful green seeming like they were shining or the shape that suited her face, but the longer she stared, the more hypnotic they became.

Taking a step backward, Lightning darted at the kitchen and escaped the vicinity she had suddenly felt trapped in. Shaking her head, she tried to collect her thoughts, confused about her sudden and unsuspected reaction. Taking a sip from her beer, she sat down on the couch and squished her eyes together. Fang couldn't be better than gone now that her migraine had developed into something more.

"Hey, you okay?"

"Yes. Just a headache," Lightning whispered, trying to keep the noises away.

"You know what, I'll leave you for tonight. We'll meet tomorrow night, okay?"

"Where?"

"You'll know," was all Fang said.

Wanting to retort, it was when her lips parted that the sound of the door being closed suddenly hit her ears like a thousand of thorns. Pressing her fingers against her eyebrows to try and erase any kind of pain, she blindly stubbed her cigarette in the ashtray and placed her beer on the table before lying down on the couch to relax.

The pain was such that she didn't even care when or where she was supposed to meet with Fang to gather more valuable pieces of intel. Right now, all she wanted to do was to sleep and soon, Lightning was heavily sleeping in her living-room with almost every light still on.

* * *

Staring at the clock over her desk, Lightning sighed for the umptieth time within a day. Yuj and Maqui were away, still investigating on the robbery and she had been left in her office, forced to process paper and thoroughly write down every single detail of previous cases. Usually, it would've been a task she adored, meaning that she could be left alone without needing to engage into conversations and pretend once more like she even cared, but today, Lightning wanted to talk to someone.

Not because of who she was, that part wasn't of any importance, but because of _what_ they would be able to talk about, the only thing truly mattering to her now.

Having slept on her couch, Lightning had been up at down and had immediately tried to figure out when she would be supposed to meet with her and it was without too much surprise that she had received a simple text message from an unknown number telling her where and when to meet with her. _Tomorrow_ - _7PM – There's a bar called The Amazon by the beach. Figure out which one._

It hadn't taken her long to figure out which beach Fang had meant but thinking this was once more part of the test Lightning had tried to remain calm during the entire search. Luckily, the beach was closest to her house and therefore wouldn't take her more than a few minutes than usual to reach.

In-between thoughts, Lightning reached out for her phone she had placed on the table without really looking in its direction, her vision blurred by her lack of inner presence as it buzzed against the desk. Clearing her throat and blinking a couple of times, she unlocked her cell phone by entering her eight-digit code and pressed on her unread messages that had now reached the number of twenty-six.

As the word _unknown_ appeared on her screen, Lightning's brain immediately started to function again. Pressing on the message, she carefully said its two only words. _Aerith Gainsborough. What the hell does that mean_ , she asked herself whilst tossing the phone back on the desk.

Rubbing her eyes untouched by makeup, she breathed out a heavy breath and tried to make sense of the name she had been given, and quickly decided to type the said-name on the internet for a quick research and as the first pictured appeared, Lightning was this close to throwing her head against the wall due to her lack of perception.

Although she had only seen the body for the quarter of the second, the missing posters she was able to find on line were more than enough to tell her who this person was. This was the third victim; the one Emma had been unable to identify because of a thorough body search before leaving the premises. But why would Fang give her the name when she knew she couldn't get more information than the one given to her? Or was this some sort of peace offering to show her she was beginning to be more trusting?

Lightning couldn't say for sure. Thoroughly, she began to read through every possible article and was quickly forced to make the same assessment than the two times before but with one more information to her quilt: the FBI had hired them and now, three girls were dead.

"Light!" Severely flinching on her seat, Lightning looked up from her screen and stared at Yuj standing underneath the door frame, a smile on his face. "We've got a suspect for the robbery, care to join the interrogation?"

"Sure. What do you have on him," she said, already turning her computer off and standing up from her seat.

"We found three diamond bracelets at his place, and a 9 millimeter."

"Idiot." Following Yuj towards the interrogation room, she pushed open the door and was immediately confronted with a tall, though guy.

Coming inside, she decided to stay standing up, leaning her shoulder against the wall as she gingerly scrutinized the person sitting in front of her two Detectives. The tattoos covering his entire arms were enough to show what kind of a man this thief was: loathing and idiotic.

"I didn't do nothing," he said for what she assumed to be the twentieth time, "You got the wrong guy."

"Are we talking about the gun or the jewelry," Yuj asked with a smile.

Remaining silent, the man only proceeded by kicking the foot of the table. Grating against the soil, Lightning's lips twitched with anger as the sound became louder and walked closer to the table with a severe look in her eyes. At this time, she refused anything, or anyone go against her rather pleased emotions.

"Or maybe we're talking about both," she said to break the silence between him and her men.

"Who's this bitch?"

Craning her neck, Lightning's vocal cords became apparent on her neck. "This _bitch_ is a Lieutenant," she perfectly articulated, "I suggest you call me something else."

"I don't care what your stupid title is. You can't keep me here forever."

"Don't worry, by the time twenty-four hours have passed, you'll be locked someplace else," she taunted with a grin, amused by his sudden change of expression. "And trust me, we have all the time in the world."

"Exactly," Yuj said standing up from his chair. "Care to share why you just got a six-thousand-dollar income?"

"I have a good job."

"What's your job, exactly?"

"Clearly not the same as yours."

Running a finger across her forehead and between her eyebrows, Lightning was looking at the man with a disgusted expression. She didn't know why most people they were bringing in needed to act like such self-sufficient douchebags, but the urge to punch them across the face was always the same.

Knocking on the door, an officer from the precinct entered, gave Yuj a paper and exited the room without adding a single word. "Well look at that," Yuj said through a smile, "the gun was stolen to…an officer of the law."

"What?!"

Grinning, Lightning crossed her arms on the chest and rose up her nose at him. "Stealing a gun to the police, using it for a robbery… That's at least five years, right guys?" She threw a glance at her Detectives who were now both nodding. "That's bad luck, isn't it?"

"That gun wasn't mine. It was placed there I'm sure."

"Isn't that convenient," Maqui snorted.

"And funny since your prints are all over it," Yuj continued, the paper still in hand. "Or did someone else do that too?"

"I've got nothing to say."

"We don't need you too. With this, we'll have enough to lock you up for a few years. Too bad you were the only one we caught, I'm sure we could've worked something out."

With a shimmer of pride in Lightning's eyes, she turned around and went directly to the door with Maqui and Yuj. Grabbing the handle, she turned it to the right but was abruptly caught off by a gruff voice asking for them to wait. Turning around, she glanced in both their Detectives direction and nodded at them both.

"I believe you've got this," she said, "Come see me later."

"Sure thing Lt."

With the handle still in her palm, she pulled the door open and exited the interrogation room without uttering an additional word.

She found herself in front of the door without truly knowing what she could now do. To her right stood Amodar's office and to her left her own, but being confined in a tight, small place wasn't something she intended on doing. Blowing out a breath, she went to the exit door and stood outside of the establishment on the terrace with a frown on her face.

Grabbing the rail, she looked at the horizon with the same emotionless expression and gazed at the sun already starting to set behind the ocean, its colour of an indescribable blue holding her attention for a long amount of time. She could've stayed there for hours if her hone hadn't started to ring inside the pocket of her black jeans, her sister's name suddenly making her remember of her existence.

Sighing with despair at her own attitude, Lightning slid her finger across the screen to answer. "Hey, Serah. What's going on?"

 _"Tonight. Dinner, my place."_

"Serah I have work to…"

 _"Don't care. Be there, 8PM."_

Flinching as the communication was cut off, Lightning brought her phone before her eyes and stared at it for a few moments, surprised and confused by her younger sister's sudden aggressiveness. Scratching the back of her head, she stuffed her phone down her pocket and grabbed her packet of cigarettes in exchange.

 _Another dinner with that oaf,_ she bitterly thought, puffing on her cigarette. _Sounds like a fantastic night ahead of me._

* * *

Standing in Serah's living-room, Lightning was holding a glass of white wine along with a burning cigarette, taking a sip she then followed by a long, soothing drag. Snow was sitting on the couch behind her and had tried to start a conversation with her, one she had immediately put an end to only by looking at him with warning eyes.

Although they had managed to arrest the three people responsible for the heist, Lightning's mind had wandered back and forth between her actual case and the one Fang was willing to share with her and the headache it had started to form had been excruciatingly painful and once more, medications had been the only thing able to help. It had taken time and had tired her more than she had planned, but the pain had in time managed to fade away.

That was until _Snow_ had begun to talk. The man himself was enough to generate a migraine unlike any other. "So, how's work," he asked still sitting on the couch, "any good cases?"

"Yes. We arrested three people today," she unsympathetically replied, refusing to turn around and face him.

"Hey, Light?" Turning around, she faced Serah holding a plate of cooked beef. "Do you ever go out of your work clothes?"

With a brow severely arched, Lightning glanced down at her outfit. What was wrong with a shirt tucked inside black jeans, supported by heels? It screamed classy and distinguished, not necessarily work.

"This isn't my work outfit," she pointed out, her head slightly tilted to the side. "I usually wear boots, it's easier when I have to run."

"Yeah but…" Rolling her eyes, Serah sighed. "Can't you just throw a t-shirt or something else than shirts?"

"I like my shirts," Lightning replied. Starting to feel aggravated, she stubbed her cigarette in the ashtray and sauntered towards the dining-room table. "It looks good," she said in the hopes of changing the subject.

"Mashed potatoes, carrots, beans and well, the meat."

Looking at her sister, Lightning took a seat at the table and was handed the first bowl of white mash, dropping a small nut of it inside of her plate, followed by the vegetables and the smallest piece of meat she could find. Not being an eater, this was as much as she could handle without feeling like blowing up from the inside.

"Bon appétit," she said, fork and knife in hand. "Thanks for the sudden invitation."

"Yes. There a reason why I wanted you to come because I have something I need to tell you."

Nodding, Lightning paid no attention to the looks both Snow and Serah were giving her. Focused on her food and cutting her steak into small pieces for her to chew on, she eventually decided to look up from her plate and gaze in their direction. Then, she looked at Serah's glass and from the colour, she knew it only contained water.

"You've got to be kidding me," she said. Glaring at Snow, she stood up from her seat with her fist already forming a little ball. "Tell me this is a fucking joke."

Not usually one to curse, or on very rare occasions, Serah's mouth dropped to the ground as Lightning went closer to Snow. "Light, calm down," she urged, jumping from her seat to stand before Snow. "Isn't it…good news?"

"How can you…" She stopped herself from talking.

The word that had wanted to slip from her lips had been _happy_ , and based on Serah's shining eyes, Lightning didn't need to be told twice that this _was_ good news. Although displeased by her choice of companion, she knew Serah would be perfect for the job.

"And you're going to be an aunt! She'll be able to learn cool stuff from you."

"She," Snow asked with a tremble in his voice.

"I'd like to believe it is," Serah replied, her smile growing even more.

Going back to her seat now that her wave of aggressiveness had faded, Lightning looked at the couple with a slight smile creasing at the corner of her lips. It was nearly invisible, but it was there, nonetheless. Maybe a new addition to the family would be a nice change of paste.

Even though Lightning detested children because of their loudness and dirtiness, she was somehow confident that this child wouldn't cause her as many problems as the ones she had encountered throughout her life. After all, this kid would have Farron blood running down in her veins; so how bad could it actually turn out to be?

"Well," Lightning said with her glass in her hand, "I'm happy for you. I hope it's everything you wish it to be."

"Thanks, Sis," Snow replied with a grin.

Frowning, Lightning retorted with "I'm not your sister," and finally began eating the meal Serah had cooked. "Anyway…How's…things?"

"You still don't know how to be around people, uh," Serah asked, a smile drawn on her lips.

"Am I that obvious?"

"Yeah, but it's fine. Wouldn't love you any other way."

A shadow of a smile tainted her lips. She continued to look at the happy couple now providing them something they clearly both wanted. And to be fair, Lightning was confident about the fact that Snow would make a great father, there was no questioning that. All she needed to do was to push back the negative feelings she felt towards him.

Perhaps that in time, these feelings would pass. Only time would be able to tell.

Sighing, she picked up her fork and continued to eat in silence, listening to conversation happening between Serah and Snow, sometimes answering the few questions being asked her way. But Lightning never once felt uneasy. Somehow, she even felt happy.

Maybe she had needed a night like this after all because there wasn't a moment she thought about anything else but her sister's happiness. What would she do without her, anyway?


	6. Six

**Hey guys! First of all, I'd like to wish you all a Merry whatever you want it to be and I hope your night will go nicely and that you will all have the evening you had planned.**

 **I'd like to thank the people sticking with me for the stories I've written (Mom, The Amazon and the others) and I'm sorry it's taking me so long to update. I haven't had the easiest of years, if not the worst really, and I got really depressed during a long period of time, but I'm back on my feet, even if the ground still feels...dangerous for me to stand on.**

 **So thanks for being supportive, it's always highly appreciated even though I never really say so.**

 **Lots of love to you all!**

 **N**

* * *

Saturday's had never truly been her favourite day of the week. Not having to go to the office, she usually tried to occupy her time with books, crossword puzzles or even TV shows, but today, Lightning had decided to go for a run before her meeting with Agent Yun later during the day.

Running alongside of the ocean, Lightning's posture was the one of a professional runner. Her spine standing straight, her arms close to her body, it had been more than forty-five minutes since she had started jogging and still, Lightning felt like she could run for hours. Plus, the weather was enjoyable, barely reaching 70°F so sweat wasn't an issue she needed to pay attention to.

She didn't really know why she had decided to go out, but she also did not regret her decision. Fresh air somehow helped to gather back her thoughts, trying to process everything that had occurred within a single week of her life. And God knew a _lot_ had happened.

Triple homicide, the Bureau invading the city, Agent Yun being a pain in her ass offering her the possibility to help however she could, her sister being pregnant from that oaf of a man Snow, there had been too many information in a lapse of time she found too short. But seeing a little action wasn't unpleasant either in the end. There wasn't a single second she found herself bored.

Keeping her head straight and her eyes staring at the horizon, Lightning continued to jog along the beach with her headset covering her ears. She had pressed on a random playlist generated by her app and hadn't been displeased with the result. Although most of these songs weren't the ones she would usually listen to during her free time, running on some electronica was rather motivational and guided her every footstep.

That was until someone waved at her from the distance. It was a woman, dressed in sports attire, her hair tied up in a bun on the top of her head. And the closer Lightning got to the woman, the clearer she became.

"Hey there," the woman said as Lightning stopped in front of her, retrieving the headset to place it around her neck, "Fancy seeing you here. Although I'm not surprised, you're running, I can see you have strong legs."

Darting down, Lightning looked at her thin yet muscular thigs. "I suppose it's one of the reasons," she replied.

"Oh, there are more?"

The lusty tone the woman -who she only now remembered her name- used was firstly confusing but as Lightning's brain started to function again, it was clear what she had meant to say. "Oh. No, there aren't."

Faking a pout, Abby dug her hazel-coloured eyes inside of her own and put up a shining smile. "That's a shame."

Certain Abby was now shamelessly flirting with her, Lightning wasn't interested in her in the slightest. Sure, she was cute and perhaps even pretty, but relationships or even sex weren't something she was truly interested in. She wasn't opposed to it, of course, but she simply lived just fine without it. Plus, the concept of intimacy and sex usually seemed ridiculous and off-putting to her, so why even try? Plus, she preferred taller women anyway, and Abby was shorter by a few inches.

"Anyway, I should get back to it," Lightning said, clear on her intention to put an end to this meaningless conversation.

"You don't have time for a cup of coffee? My treat, I promise."

Bothered by the question and the sudden invasion of her privacy as Abby took a step closer, Lightning replied by shaking her head from left to right with much vigour.

"I'm fine, thanks. Running will be just fine for me."

"Can I at least get your number, in case you want to meet up one day?"

Sighing, Lightning brought her fingers to the bridge of her nose and massaged it the entire time she stared deadpan at the very insistent young woman. Realizing she wouldn't give up and would probably offer to run alongside her in case she refused, Lightning brought her cell phone from her pocket and handed it to the woman with a frown, displeased by the outcome of the conversation.

Taking it, Abby entered a few numbers and immediately pressed call to make sure she too, would be in possession of her number. "Great," she said handing it back to her, "I'll make sure to call you whenever I have the time. See you soon…"

"Lightning."

"Pleased to meet you then, Lightning. Bye!"

Cheerfully waving, Lightning faked a tight smile and followed Abby with her eyes as she jogged in the opposite direction, seeming much lighter than before. She observed her for a while, waiting for her to be out of her line of sight so she could breathe a deep, heavy and desperate sigh. This was one way to kill her mood, that was for sure.

Defeated, she placed her headset back over her ears and listened to the song that had kept playing during her not quick enough exchange with Abby but running wasn't on her to-do list anymore. Instead, she sat down on the sand with her knees close to her body, her arms wrapped around them, and she stared at the calm waves hitting the shore under the shining sun.

It was funny how relaxing the sight of the water could be, and how many memories it always seemed to bring back to the surface. It wasn't ground breaking ones of course, but to her they were important. After all, she and her family always used to come here on Sunday's to have a picnic on the beach, her mother and father happy to spend time with their two daughters that were always locked up in their respective rooms.

It was a moment they all shared together, enjoying the scent of the ocean mixed with the one of hot sand, their toes wiggling underneath the millions of pieces of rock and talking about their weeks, work or studies. Although Lightning rarely engaged in the conversations, she listened with her sunglasses pushed to the bridge of her nose and a book by her side, elbowing on the ground and listening to their voices colliding with the sound of the water hitting the shore. It was a moment of pure relaxation.

In retrospect, perhaps she should've participated in their conversations, now that she was unable to do it. A wave of sadness went across her face, her vision getting blurred by the few tears that were menacing to roll down on her cheeks at this thought. How long has it been since she had heard her mother laugh whilst her father would read her the latest news with an annoying voice he once used to amuse her. How she missed those days where the future was just a big question mark standing over at the horizon, surrounded by happy days.

It seemed trivial to think of such things now that they didn't matter anymore. She wouldn't get another chance to save them, to stop them from going out to this lame party that people who didn't even matter had decided to throw to celebrate the warm days of the summer.

Sniffling, Lightning lifted her head to face the sun, stopping the tears that had yet to disappear to be shed. There was no need for crying about something that had happened so long ago, not after everything she had managed to accomplish with her sister's help. She was a proud Lieutenant and Serah was a kindergarten teacher who now carried life inside of her to start a new generation of Farrons'.

Looking back at the ocean, Lightning gave herself a mental push and go back to her feet, the music still playing in her ears, waiting for her to grab that motivation and start running once again. With a shake of the head and breathing out a sharp breath, she grabbed that motivation in both her hands and started trotting towards the end of the beach, towards the cliffs.

Gone were the days she remembered, and back was her eternal thirst for avengement. Back where the faces of all the people she had arrested and put in jail for murders, theft or hit and runs and with them, her pride for a job well done. Letting a smile invade her face, Lightning pressed harder towards the cliff until she started to sprint in their direction, the sand flying in every direction each and every time her foot got buried deeper inside the soil.

Finally, the motivation she had waited for the entire day was enveloping her from head to toe, and back was her desire to learn more about Agent Yun's face. To say she had started to feel defeated towards the entire situation would've been an understatement, really. During the entire morning, all she had done had been to convince herself this wasn't a one-way voyage towards chaos but now, the Lightning was confident of the fact that they would achieve this. Being praised wouldn't matter if it meant putting dangerous people in jail. Wasn't that everything she wanted anyway?

Inwardly nodding to her own thoughts, Lightning continued to press harder in direction of the end of the beach, her legs slowly starting to ache but nevertheless, there was not stopping her anymore. Once more, she knew was she wanted: victory, no matter the cost, no matter the consequences.

* * *

Lightning arrived at The Amazon a little before seven, wanting to take the time to think back to her latest conversation with Agent Yun. Reiterating the facts in her mind, she sometimes brought the cigarette burning between her fingers to her lips, slowly inhaling and exhaling the smoke out for it to collide with the air and vanish above her head. _It started in Washington with an FBI agent killed. They hired informants, hence the sudden change of weight and gain of muscles and why they vanished from thin air._

Frowning, she looked over at the ocean, looking at the moon that had now replaced the sun who was shining its rays on the other side of the globe. Taken aback by the ringtone suddenly bursting from her pocket, it took everything Lightning got not to let her cigarette fall down the ground. Snatching it, she read the name and unlocked it with a single slide of the finger.

"Where are you?"

 _"To your right, sitting next to the bar. This will have to be quick."_

Hanging up, Lightning threw her cigarette in the nearest street bin and sauntered in direction of the place. Being located at the beach, the entire place was left open and therefore prevented Lightning from suffocating to death. Passing by a few people, she spotted a mass of wavy dark-coloured hair and pressed in its direction.

"Took you long enough didn't it?"

"I've been here for more than five minutes I'll have you know," Lightning countered whilst taking a seat on the opposite bench.

"What's with the disguise," Fang asked, pointed at her t-shirt accentuating her every form.

"Serah suggested I stop dressing work-like. No time like the present to try."

"Well look at that, there's a body under all this stiffness," Fang teased.

The joke, however, if joke it even was, wasn't appreciated. Slamming her eyebrows down, she glared at the Agent for a few seconds, her fists turning to balls under the table. "Aren't you a funny one," she grunted.

"Ah Farron, if we want this to work, we'll need to find common ground. I can't have a partner looking so damn angry all the time."

"I'm not angry, I'm focused."

Heartily laughing, Fang shook her head from side to side and waved at a waitress coming their way. "What are you drinking?"

Gazing from Agent Yun to the waitress, Lightning greeted her with a forced smile. Her eyes, however, did not follow. "I'll have a glass of Chardonnay."

Flicking her eyes in Yun's direction, Lightning was able to perceive the small smirk already forming at her lips. "I'll have the same beer," she said without once darting away from her, the same feeling sinking inside of her stomach as green eyes pierced inside her own. "Wine, uh? Why am I not surprised?"

"I guess I'm _that_ predictable," Lightning said, her tone drooling with annoyance.

"Oh, I wouldn't say that…You're wearing a t-shirt after all."

There was a thin line between anger and love, but the one between anger and _hate_ was infinitesimal. Trying her best to stay seated, Lightning focused her attention on anything but the person causing such a strong reaction. It was unsettling how enormous her hatred for her had turned out to be.

Cracking her neck, she waited in silence for the waitress to bring her that glass of one she now needed more than ever and was blessed by the Gods as it landed in front of her face.

"Can you give me another one? I'm sure this won't be enough," Lightning uttered with a dismissive glance in Fang's direction. "Thanks," she said after the waitress politely nodded, giving both of the women a curious look.

Waiting for her to be gone once more, Lightning picked up her drink and noticed Agent Yun had been waiting for her to do so. "Cheers, Lieutenant Farron."

"Cheers, Agent Yun."

Clicking their glasses together, they both swallowed a first sip from their respective drinks and eyes each other carefully. It felt like a ring had surrounded her, and the two opponents were trying to figure out how to act and how to predict their moves. Truth was, it was as if they had been placed on a chessboard and had been placed instead of the King. And now, it was their turn to move the pieces and be, as Yun had previously stated, three steps ahead.

"So, do you still want in," Fang asked, breaking the silence.

"I do," she instantly replied. "I'm sure of it."

With a smile, Lightning thanked the waitress for the second glass now joining her first still full one and let her gaze wander to the table as a dossier was pushed in her direction. Instantly, she recognized the one Fang had first brought to her place, two night ago and was immediately enthralled by its sight.

Going to grab it, she was slapped by a strong hand and immediately darted in Fang's direction. "Not so fast tiger," Fang said through a smile, "I need to ask you a few more things and I need you to sign this."

Watching as a single sheet of paper was pushed in her direction along with a pen, Lightning stared at it with much confusion. "What's this?"

"This," Fang started, "is a contract. Read it."

"A contract?"

"Yes. So you keep your mouth shut about this or anything related to it." Frowning much more, Lightning focused her attention on the document and began to read.

As Fang had said, this entire document was a warning in case of a possible leak. The repercussions that would be taken and such, as well as the different things Lightning would not be allowed to do: talk about the case, even suggest the case, contact her, contact someone related to the case. In a gist, she needed to pretend as if it had never existed in the first place, forgotten inside her mind.

Thoroughly reading the entire document, she paused at the last line written above the place for a signature. _By agreeing to the previous statements, you will also make yourself available to the FBI at any given time and for as long as needed_.

Thinking about it, this document was probably the one they had given their informants throughout the year that had led not one, not two, but three young women to their deaths. And perhaps even more. Looking at the pen, she grabbed it and placed the tip against the paper, standing still for a few remaining seconds before finally, her name appeared in black.

"Welcome to the team, Lieutenant Farron," Fang said as she picked up the paper, "this is now yours to go through."

Once more, the dossier was pushed in her direction but this time, her hand wasn't slapped away. Seizing the file, she opened it up and glanced at the first confidential page appearing before her eyes and in an instant Lightning found herself absorbed by the dozens, in not hundreds of detail she was given permission to see.

Flicking the pages, she did not touch her glass of wine once, nor did she dart up in Agent Yun's direction, carefully reading every single word that had been written with black-coloured ink. And it was only when she was finally willing to ask a question that she realized Fang was gone, a twenty-dollar bill sitting next to her empty glass of beer.

Looking in every direction, she was perplexed by the discretion with which she had left the seat and tried to spot her away in the distance. But Agent Yun was gone, and she probably wouldn't see her for the next few days. Without taking the time to finish her second glass of wine but gulping the first one as quickly as possible, Lightning added a five-dollar bill to the tip and left the bar with the folder stuffed inside of her closed bag.

Quickly, paranoia took the better of her and made her seem as if everyone was watching her every move and even following her towards her car, and the faster she walked, the scarier the situation became. Nearly jogging in the end, she entered her car and turned on the ignition in less than a few seconds, forgetting about her seatbelt as she left her parking spot, already driving home towards her house.

Trying not to raise any suspicions even though there was no need to, Lightning carefully drove back to the North of West-Hollywood, checking inside her rear-view mirror every car suddenly driving behind her, making sure she wasn't followed by someone who could've been listening to the entire conversation. Even though they hadn't talked much and had mostly been aggressive towards one another, Lightning couldn't help but shake the feeling she _was_ being followed even though there wasn't a single proof of it happening.

As her house finally came into view, Lightning decided to accelerate and was behind her walls and her closed door merely minutes later.

She dropped her jacket on the couch and was already headed towards her office, kicking her boots in the corner of the room before grabbing the file out of her purse. She pushed a few papers from her desk, but then decided to spread every piece of information on the ground in chronological order, a task taking her no less than half-an-hour. The file was thick to say the least, and the things it counted were enough to confuse Lightning to a whole new level.

More than ten women had been found dead within a one-year span and all of them had been given the same profile: abused as a child, wanting to serve a purpose and take revenge. Girls who had thought that joining the FBI would somehow protect them from the darkest corners of the world. How wrong they had all been, now laying six-feet underground only to be devoured by worms.

But now, Lightning was one of them, too. She was going to help the Bureau, though not in the same way as them ,but still, Lightning was putting herself at risk as well as her entire family. Why was it ringing alarm bells only now? Why hadn't she thought about her sister before and only about her obsession?

Closing her eyes, she sat down at the edge of her desk and tried to ignore the sudden panic that had started to grab her by the gut. Pictures of Serah being found dead on the streets made those alarms ring even louder, and soon, a devastating headache took its position. _Fuck_.

Without taking another second to breathe, Lightning exited her office and painfully walked towards the living-room to retrieve her tobacco and weed. Perhaps a joint would be able to calm her down, to make her feel less distraught by the situation she had willingly trapped herself in. Quickly, she rolled her medicine into a thin line and did not think twice before lighting it on.

Leaning inside her couch, she closed her eyes and let the marijuana serve its purpose. Slowly relaxing her, she suddenly felt as if sleep was yelling at her to go and lie down before hunger pointed his out from under the doorframe. The idea of a slice of pizza, or anything at all to be fair was being imprinted in her brain and replaced the nagging pain she had suddenly been forced to go through.

With the enticing thought of food still glued inside her mind, Lightning sluggishly got up from the couch and headed in direction of the kitchen for a well-deserved meal consisting of a chocolate yogurt and a big green apple, and automatically went back to the living-room.

Eating her yoghourt, she sat in complete silence, listening to the branches taping against the kitchen windows without truly thinking of anything of importance. She was content or at least, she felt like it.

It wasn't long until Lightning headed towards her bedroom, facing her desk, and laid down on her bed to try and fall asleep but with the first euphoric effects now gone, her mind was back to its usual crowded place and with it, every single detail of the case was re-written before her eyes. Staring at her ceiling wearing nothing but shorts and a tank-top with the letters LAPD written in white, Lightning decided to sit at the edge of the bed and cover her face in the palm of her hands.

"They know it's a ring handling drugs, prostitution, and hitmen," Lightning whispered to herself. 'They track down one guy named Alfredo…something, but it was found hanging in his living room." Pausing, she stood up from her bed and staggered towards her office. Turning the light on, she kneeled on the floor and gazed at the many papers still spread across the room. "The found prints on the body but weren't able to trace them to anyone…" Running her fingers through her hair, Lightning darted to the right and brought one of the papers closer to her eyes. "Johnathan McKiley was arrested three months ago but released due to insufficient charges…Here I thought the FBI could make one up for their convenience."

Grabbing her laptop from her side, she waited for her internet connection to be made and entered the name of Johnathan in the police's database and waited for a while for the search to be over. _Suspected robbery, suspected murder, rape, kidnapping, torture_ …This was had so many things on his list the fact he had never spent more than one night in jail was enough to make her angry.

Gritting her teeth together and nearly turning them into piles of dust in her mouth, Lightning got up from the ground and turned the white-board around in such a way that she could have the necessary space to write what her next plan of action would be.

Although she knew Fang would be less than pleased, she had also made it clear that she was now part of the team and there had been no restrictions when it came about investigating on her own. The only thing she needed to do was to stay quiet.

Picking up a marker from the ground, she firstly placed it between her lips before bringing the tip to the board, writing the name of Johnathan McKiley in red before bending down the retrieve the pictures of every single person that had been placed under arrest and that had managed to get out of it because of insufficient proof. In total, six people, all men had been targeted by the FBI and from the six…Five had died. Except for Johnathan.

After taking a few steps back and after twenty more minutes, Lightning looked at her entire board with knitted brows. Red lines had now been added between pictures of buildings and bodies, reconstructing the file in her entire room, victims on one side and possible killers on the other but for now, no links could be made between them both. For now, anyway.

It was around four in the morning when Lightning finally gave into sleep. Exhausted and defeated by the lack of evidence being able to help her solve anything, she had gone to her bed in the hopes a long night of sleep would finally be able to unlock something more…Something she was missing, but something Fang was missing too.


	7. Seven

**Taking the opportunity to wish you all a Happy New Year's Eve! I hope you'll all have a great beginning in 2019 and that you'll enjoy this new chapter :)**

 **Lots of love! N**

 **PS: Sorry if you see any mistakes!**

* * *

Lightning woke up thirty minutes after her usual waking time and already, panic had started to settle inside her mind at the idea of being late to the precinct. Jumping from the bed, she instantly made a beeline towards the end of the hallway and kicked open the bathroom-door. She had five minutes to use the toilet and before if she wanted to drink her coffee, but somehow, the situation deemed impossible to achieve.

Undressing as quickly as possible whilst sitting on the toilet, Lightning was up from the seat, had flushed and was under the cold shower drain the very next second. The ice-coldness of the water was unpleasant to say the least, but it allowed her to feel awake. Washing her hair ad body, she rinsed them as fast as she could, storming out of her bathroom with nothing but a towel around her waist and marched towards the kitchen.

After turning on the coffee machine sitting near her fridge, Lightning had to juggle between clean and dirty mugs, silently condemning herself for not having cleaned anything during her weekend but truth was, the time had flown by. Her last twenty-four hours had been spent looking at papers, searching on line to try and find more information or to link the different clues together by using a colour code. Red for the girls, blue for the men and green for the links she was almost certain existed. She couldn't even say how late she had decided to go to bed to gather some energy for her day, but based on her lateness, Lightning knew she hadn't slept enough.

As the light finally stopped blinking on the machine, Lightning pressed on another button and jumped back towards her bedroom, now nearly dry. Tossing the towel on her bed, she walked naked in direction of the dresser and gazed for a second at her reflection in the mirror. Though her skin was pale, it also seemed like she was sick. The bags under her eyes were or no help, but the posture she had taken, looking like an older woman was enough to slightly make her flinch.

 _No time to fixate on this, get a move on!_ Shaking her head, she opened the dresser and selected her outfit for the day: a shirt, a black pair of jeans and of course, fresh underwear. Fully dressed one minute later, Lightning was back in the kitchen and pouring extra cold milk inside of her coffee. Twirling the content of the mug with a spoon, she then placed the mug at her lips and swallowed the still warm entire coffee without taking the time to breathe.

Then, it was a race to brush her teeth, grab an apple from the fridge and try at least to apply a brushing to her pink-coloured hair. The result it gave wasn't excellent, but it would have to do for the day. At 7:57 AM, Lightning had finally managed to grab everything she needed for the day and storm in direction of her car.

Unlocking it as she walked towards the Mustang, Lightning was quick to sit down behind the wheel and turn the ignition on. Beating fast, her heart was deafeningly loud, thumping against her ears to hush her surroundings. So as she felt a presence next to her, Lightning didn't think twice to react.

With a force similar the one of a bull, she slammed her fist up against whatever, or whoever had decided to enter the car without giving the permission and the loud grunt that was given in return made her severely flinch.

"Jesus fucking Christ Fang what are you doing here," she yelled at the woman, both of them exiting the car.

"God, Farron, can't ya just chill for a bit," Fang barked back, both her hands covering a very bloody nose.

"How dare you jump into my car like that, you nearly gave me a heart attack!"

"And ya broke my goddamn nose, I think we can call it even!"

Managing to calm the beating of her heart, Lightning walked in direction of Fang to make sure nothing had been actually broken but the closer she got, the whiter her face started to become. As Fang retrieved her hands from her nose, Lightning was quickly reassured at the sight if a bloody one, but luckily not broken.

"You're fine," she said, uninterested by her presence. "I'm late for work."

"I don't give a damn," Fang snarled under her breath. "Drive me home, I need to fix this."

Gritting her teeth against one another, Lightning sharply turned back around and scowled in her direction. "I don't have the time to do that." With a glance at her watch, she said, "Come inside, I'll handle it."

"Bein' my goddamn nurse isn't on the contract Farron!"

"I don't give a fuck! I don't have time to waste, come here."

She grabbed her by the wrist and guided her back towards her house, her eyes darkening the closer she got to the door. Her morning was on for an awful day. Slamming the keys inside the lock, she entered the house and continued to guide the wounded Agent towards the kitchen, painfully trying to ignore the drops of blood dripping on the ground.

"There, wait here," she urged as she sat Fang down on a stool. Walking out of the kitchen, she strode towards the bathroom to retrieve her first-aid kit and was back with Agent Yun only a few moments later. "Take off your hand," she urged, "let me see how bad it is." Observing the bump that had started to form, Lightning fought hard not to let a chuckle escape. Pressing her lips together, she carefully cleaned her nose and applied ice cubes she retrieved from the freezer and placed in a hand glove. "Hold this."

Taking a few steps to the side, Lightning placed herself in front of her Fang and gave her a look. "What?"

"Why did you sneak into my car," she asked with her arms crossed on her chest.

"I told you the FBI could need you at any given moment," Fang mumbled, trying to hold the glove on her nose, "this is one of those moments." Pausing she winced in pain trying to relax the muscles in her face. "Christ you pack a mean punch Farron."

"Imagine what I can do with two."

The smirk that invaded Fang's lips was unmistakable and the realization of the meaning of the words she had used made her understand why.

"Didn't think you were the flirting kind of woman," Fang taunted.

"If this is what you call flirting, I wonder how you even get girls."

"Well my, Lieutenant, did someone do some digging?"

"What does it matter, Agent Yun? You never said anything about investigating you."

"I guess that's fair since I've done the exact same thing… Didn't know you were once arrested for excessive driving," Fang said, a drawl in her mouth. "You didn't tell me that during our interrogation."

"I was sixteen, I didn't think it would matter. Plus, you didn't ask me any questions about the matter." Coming closer, she pushed Fang's hand away and gave her nose a quick look-at. "You have a small cut on your skin, let me clean it and patch it up."

In silence, Lightning proceeded to the cleaning of the wound, carefully placing a band-aid, small in size, to cover it up. Trying to touch her as little as possible so she wouldn't cause another damage, Lightning stayed focused during the entire process before she went back before Fang to look at her. Though her skin had started to turn purple under her eyes and around her nose, she still looked the same irritating self.

"Okay, now can we go?"

"We're going where I want us to go," Fang said, her voice rough. "Call your boss and tell him you can't make it today."

"What? What am I going to tell him?"

"You figure out. We're taking your car, I'm driving."

"In your wildest dreams, Yun." Snatching her keys from the kitchen island, Lightning waved in direction of Fang and led them both back to the car. "I'm going to the precinct, that's final."

Opening the driver's door, it was quickly slammed back shut by a powerful kick. Scared by the action, Lightning jumped to the side with her hands on her gun, ready to point it in the menace's direction. Watching Fang clenching both of her fists and giving her the most terrifying look, Lightning had to swallow the lump that had formed inside her throat.

"Listen to me Farron, if you thought this would be a fun ride you got on the wrong carousel. If I tell you to do something you do it without questioning me, is that clear?"

"I'm not a tool for you to play with, Fang," Lightning countered.

"That's exactly what you signed to be," Fang said, a finger pointed at her chest. "I never gave you a sudden promotion. You're here to help since you so preciously want it, so I'd advise you obey me."

Her jaw couldn't have crashed hard enough on the pavement as she replayed the words Fang had just yelled. "Obey," she mirthlessly asked, "is this your idea of a joke?"

"Do I look like I'm in the mood to make a joke?"

Staring at her, Lightning was conflicted between trying to lighten the mood, or simply do as she was told. Though not being fazed by orders, there was something about Fang that made her want to do as much as she could to bother her more. Instead of doing so, she handed the keys in her direction and reluctantly walked in direction of the passenger door and took a seat on the chair.

"Where are we going," she asked.

"You'll see," she aggressively answered. "Call your boss now."

Breathing out a deep sigh of despair, Lightning pressed on her boss's number and made the call. Managing to find a lie fitting to the situation, telling Amodar she was stuck with a headache without any other and therefore glancing in Fang's direction, Lightning was left alone without a warning. However, she also knew that these sudden days off would soon start to sound alarm-bells throughout the precinct. After all, she had never missed one day in her life and being surrounded by detectives would not help her case.

"I'm sorry I angered you," Lightning said after a little while, unaware of where they were heading.

"You need to understand that you don't make the rules in this situation, Lightning. And breaking my nose surely did not help your case."

"That was an honest mistake, Fang."

"Tell that to my nose," she answered, her tone still sounding angrier than usual.

Scratching at the nape of her neck, Lightning pressed her head against the window and looked as buildings disappeared and were replaced by trees. She didn't where they were heading, and didn't even know if they were leaving town, but she oddly felt at ease. Truth was, Lightning was so tired she was ready to fall asleep and be awoken at their destination, fighting as her eyes suddenly felt heavy.

Clearing her throat, she sat back straight and darted in Fang's direction, observing how focused she was even while driving a car. It seemed like nothing but the road existed, her eyes staring straight ahead of her as they reached the highway leaving the city of Los Angeles.

"You're staring at me again."

"Where are we going?"

"I'm guessing you read the file I gave you?" Lightning nodded affirmatively. "Did you come across a Johnathan?"

"Yes, I did."

"We have a hideout in front of his place. Well, I provided us one. We're going there and spending the night."

"The _night?!"_ Nearly shouting in Fang's ear, Lightning picked up her cell-phone and checked her calendar. With a frown, she quickly entered a number and placed the phone at her ear. "Hello? Yes, this is Lightning Farron, I'd like to cancel my appointment tonight. Yes, something came up. Next week? Wait a moment." Bringing her phone back in front of her eyes, she quickly gave her calendar another glance and continued, "Yes, five o'clock will do. Thank you, Doctor."

Locking her phone, she placed it between her thighs and closed her eyes. Pushing back the appointment she had taken a few weeks ago, she was in luck to have received another only a week's time but still, it was one she rarely missed.

"Everything good," Fang asked, genuinely showing interest.

"Yes, everything is fine." Lightning coldly replied. "Thank you for asking," she quietly added, her head slowly falling to the side.

"Good night."

"I'm not going to sleep, I'm just resting."

Discretely yawning against the window, Lightning knew she wouldn't be able to pretend for long. Tired had now overcome her, and not needing to be alert for at least an additional hour, the thought of a short nap suddenly became alluring. And plus, not having to talk to Fang for a least thirty minutes seemed like a dream come true. Yawning once more, she crossed her arms on her chest and let herself be rocked to sleep by the rhythm of the car.

* * *

The pain had finally stopped spreading across her entire face a few moments after she had heard the soft snoring coming from her right. _Didn't take her long_ , she thought with a smile, staring at the road. Sighing, Fang unwrapped her right hand from the wheel and ran it through her wild hair, carefully maneuvering the car with the other. God knew she'd probably have more than a broken nose if she were to scratch the hood of Lieutenant's Farron car or even be suddenly murdered.

Boy did this woman have a temper. Although it didn't bother her and often amused her, she couldn't believe people actually managed her more than a couple of days. Coming back to that frown and that aggressivity wasn't something she believed to be enjoyable, but then, perhaps was there more to the mysterious Lieutenant than she showed but for some reason, Fang knew she wouldn't more information than the ones she had received.

TO be fair, the question she had asked her hadn't been necessary. Of course, a background had been made to see if she was worth the trouble, but she had only asked Lightning's question to listen to her tone. A file could have everything, but the tone of voice was considered important when it came to an answer.

Glancing on the right at a sound echoed in the car, Fang couldn't help but to shake her head ever so slightly at the sight of Lightning's face now facing towards her, her eyelids slightly flickering due to a dream. _She had to be pretty, eh?_ Breathing out a deep sigh, Fang brought her line of sight back to the road and automatically turned on the radio. Lowering the volume, she selected a rock channel and let her head bounce from side to side. How she had survived without any music for the ten first minutes she had driven was perplexing. God knew she couldn't live without it. For some reason, she believed her sleeping passenger would disagree with the fact music was important unless she had turned the radio on herself before falling to a deep sleep which evidently, she didn't.

"What is this now," she whispered at the sight of a line of cars blocking the entire highway. "You've got to be kiddin' me."

Slowing down Lightning's Mustang, Fang then realized what sort of car this was. This wasn't the vehicle of a civilian, but one of a police officers and therefore…it possessed sirens. Looking at the dashboard, she was quick to find the button starting the lights, immediately followed by the loud alarms having the effect she had been praying for. Soon, all the cars were getting out of the way and Fang was free to continue her way towards Santa Maria, no less than an hour away.

With a smile and a cigarette at her lips, she carefully continued to drive down the coast, fighting the sun now starting to fully shine over the trees whilst Lightning continued to sleep by her side.

* * *

"Wake up Sunshine, we need to be quick about this."

Feeling as if a hammer had suddenly crashed against her temple, Lightning's eyes opened to the sight of an abandoned, shitty old building merely standing straight and was quickly reminded of the nightmare she had trapped herself in. Although surprised to having slept the entire way, the city where Fang had driven them didn't seem to be the kind of place she'd spend her holidays at. Jumping from her seat with her bag in her hand, she waited for Fang to lock up the doors and started to follow her in front of the building she had been staring at with disgust.

"We have to spend an entire night there?"

"Oh, I'm so sorry your Highness," Fang drawled, "would you prefer a resort or a five-star hotel maybe?"

Throwing a glare at the nape of her neck, Lightning blew out a heavy breath before keeping the airt inside of her lungs as a heavy metallic door was pulled opened, releasing aa terrifying screeching sound. Wincing, she stood still in front of the door for a few seconds before entering the damp hallway and followed Fang up the stairs of the building.

From what she could tell, the building was completely abandoned. Not a living soul was to be found as they went up the four flights of stairs, tiptoeing and grazing the walls to avoid the mold that had started to build up on the wooden steps. Dying from a fall in a shitty building located in a shitty neighbourhood was clearly not on her wish-list, and no matter how deeply Fang sighed of despair, Lightning continued to take her time.

"How are you a police officer?"

"By being careful, Agent Yun. You ought to do the same if you don't want to end up with a bullet in your knee," she said, her tone bitter.

"Slow your horses, we're not even married yet and you're threatening me with a divorce?"

With clenched fists and gritted teeth, Lightning finally reached the hallway and was able to look at Fang in the eye, the smirk that had invaded her lips never seeming to fade away, no matter the circumstances. Even with a lumped nose and bloodshot eyes, she still managed to remain obnoxious and really far from everything she tolerated in a person, man or woman.

Only giving her a desperate shake of the head, Lightning followed Agent Yun towards the darkest side of the building and unintentionally started to feel uneasy. Checking over her shoulder, she brought one hand to the pistol on her belt and gingerly walked closer to Fang, her eyes darting in every possible direction.

"Where are you taking me?"

"Right…there."

Glancing to a door on her left, Lightning observed as Fang retrieved keys from her pocket and slammed it inside the door. Turning them several times inside the lock, she listened to the nearby sounds with a sense of dread. Water dripping, people laughing, people arguing… _What the fuck am I doing?_

"There, you can enter."

"You go first," Lightning murmured, "I'm not going there first."

"You don't like to put your trust in others, do you?"

"I _don't_ put my trust in others," Lightning corrected as Fang entered the apartment, "there's a difference."

"Whatever you say. You can come in by the way."

Raising her nose in the air, Lightning gingerly walked towards the door and went inside the flat, carefully shutting the door behind her back. Sniffing the air, she was surprised by the smell of roses and vanilla filling the flat and the closer she got to Fang, the stronger the scent became.

Finally reaching the living-room, she gave the room a quick look over and it was without much surprise that she found it to be rather empty. At the windows stood two chairs, a table and a laptop, and a board was hanging on the wall, already containing several different information she believed Fang had gathered. This clearly wasn't the first nor the second time she was here, based on the cans and empty bottles aligned on the floor. Getting closer to them, Lightning's first reflex was to pick them up under Fang's perplexed gaze only to throw them away in the nearest plastic bag.

Only when she felt more at ease with the environment was Lightning able to drop her bag to the ground, jacket on the chair and come closer to the board with undivided attention, watching every picture that had been taken with an extreme amount of care. The man looked the same as the one pictured, she had seen in the file, tall, thin, good-looking, he hadn't changed for a bit.

The confidence he emanated hadn't washed away either, based on the numerous sexual acts he had done ever since Fang had started to keep track of him.

"Why…Why did you take those," she asked, her cheeks slightly turning pink.

"Why did I take what," Fang asked coming closer. "Oh! I was aiming the girls to be fair."

"At the…" Averting her eyes, Lightning glanced out the window.

"In case they end up being killed. Get your head out of the gutter, Farron!"

Flinching as a strong hand patted her on the shoulder, Lightning quickly glanced back at the board. Gathering everything, she spent the next twenty-minutes reading through documents describing his moves, his whereabouts, and his usual hangouts. Although nothing seemed to stick out, she also knew she couldn't take anything lightly when it came to this case.

"So, he usually stays home from nine to twelve and then goes to a bar? Exciting life," Lightning muttered, mostly to herself.

"Yep," Fang answered.

Surprised she had even heard he talk, Lightning walked towards the second chair that had been left untouched. Looking at the high-quality binoculars standing in front of the window, she carefully placed both her against the object and immediately found herself staring at him.

"He has a lot of tattoos."

"You don't like tattoos," Fang asked.

"I don't mind them. But when there's a lot, it's not aesthetically pleasing to the eye."

"I'm guessing you don't have any?"

A smile vaguely creased the corner of her lips. Pulling away from the binoculars, she waited for Fang to look in her direction, one of her eyebrows standing at attention. "Maybe, maybe not."

"Oh, well look at that. Lieutenant Farron isn't so predictable anymore."

"Do you have to be such an asshole every single time?"

"Maybe, maybe not," Fang joked, her eyes back on the target. "Just take a chill pill, perhaps that can help."

"You were the one asking me to meet you in the middle, I'm going to ask you to do the same. We don't have to like each other, and you know what," Lightning asked, back on her feet, "we don't even have to talk. Let's just stay out of each other's way until tomorrow morning, how does that sound?"

She didn't receive much of an answer except for a sigh, a shake of the head and a judging look, but words were never given to her. Not that it mattered anyway. As long as Fang wouldn't be her obnoxious self for more than ten minutes, Lightning considered it as a victory.

"You're a tough nut to crack Farron, I'll give you that. But this is the last time you ever talk to me like this."

"If you stop treating me like shit, I will."

"You're incredibly rude, you know that?

"I just…" The sound of her ringtone both made them slightly flinch. Aggravated, Lightning took the occasion to retrieve herself in another room and answered the phone. "What?"

 _"Wow, you sound angry."_

"Yuj," Lightning said, "what's going on?"

 _"There's a new body. But you're not here and Yun isn't here either…_ "

Closing her eyes, Lightning brought her fingers to the bridge of her nose and pinched the skin. "A coincidence. What's with the body?"

 _"Young girl…throat sliced…Rings any bells?"_

"You're kidding me." Going back towards the living-room, she quickly shushed by Fang holding a phone at her own ear. Discretely going backwards, she closed the bedroom door and said, "I'll be there a soon as possible. Get everything you can from the victim."

She didn't leave Yuj to give her and answer, already back inside the living-room staring right back at Fang. They eyed one another for a few moments, carefully trying to think through their next action. IT was Fang, would made the decision for them both.

"You're staying here."

"Excuse you?"

"If we arrive at the same time it'll be too suspicious, and I'll kick you out of the case anyway." Already snatching the keys from her pocket, Fang walked towards the door and continued; "I'll be back as soon as I can, _and_ I'm taking your car."

"Absolutely not," Lightning said, sprinting after her.

Eventually managing to snatch her wrist, it was with great surprise and a sheer amount of force that Lightning was pushed against the wall, both her hands maintained over her head. The rage that shone from her eyes was unmistakable, but Fang refused to let go. They stared at each other angrily, and that anger turned to something else. Hunger. Pure and raw devouring her from within.

Swallowing her saliva, Lightning fought to keep her breath between her lungs, refusing to inhale the air surrounding Fang's body, the perfume she had yet to ignore still strongly affecting her senses. With her eyes boring into hers, Lightning was unable to fight back. Mesmerized but et extremely enraged, not a single muscle in her body accepted to react. She was simply turned to stone.

"You're staying here, and keep an eye on him," Fang said, forcing Lightning to look at her lips. "If he moves, you move. There's a bike in the bathroom, take it."

"I…"

Letting her go, Fang opened the front door and shut it back in a two seconds span, leaving her alone in the middle of the hallway, her back still pressed against the wall. Rubbing at her left wrist, she looked at the trace of Fang's finger wrapped around her skin and closed her eyes to forget any of this had ever happened.

Shaking her head ever so slightly, she went back to the living and took a seat before the binoculars, digging her gaze into the glasses to stare at the wanted man. But there wasn't a split second where Lightning thought of anything else but Fang, and the thought was unbecoming of her. Running her hand through her fingers, she blinked a few times and gathered her thoughts back to the essential. She had a man to frame. It was all that mattered.

It was around three in the morning when Fang came back from Los Angeles, a new piece of information in hand. After immediately warning Lightning of the situation about Yuffie Kisaragi, the new victim. But this time, this woman hadn't been FBI but had truly been missing for the past two years. She, therefore, found out Yuffie had staged a disappearance due to severe domestic abuse, and escape Tokyo to come to Los Angeles. She was working as a bouncer, in one of the most dangerous parts of town, and usually got into contact with some bad people: drug addicts, drug dealers, murderers…

The MO had been the exact same and the same poison was found in the wound, some sort of signature to a perfect fourth murder.

"That's what we know so far. Your Detectives kindly gave us the body, no one actually yelled at me this time."

"Because you could've possibly made it in time," Lightning answered, still sitting at the window.

"Well, when you drive 150 on an 80… It goes pretty fast."

"Whatever." Shaking her head, Lightning got up from the seat and snatched a bottle of water from the table and chugged down the liquid to help slide a pill for her head.

"What's up with the migraines? You have them quite often," Fang asked as she took a seat to see the apartment.

"It's not a big deal", she answered with a small wave of her hand, "nothing to be concerned about."

"I'd be conserved about it," Fang continued, her eyes glued to the binoculars. "Do you know where it comes from?"

Sighing, Lightning went back to sit closer to Fang and shook her head. "Not really. I have scanners and MRI's every three months, but they don't know what caused it. Stress perhaps, anxiety…They're not sure."

"I'm sorry, that sucks. I hope they figure it out someday."

"Oh, I don't. For now, I have nothing. Just headaches. If they find out something, I'm not sure I'd want to know what it is."

"If you see it like that, I guess not."

Nodding, Lightning averted her eyes and looked down at her hands. Exhaustion had started to take a toll on her and sleep was calling for her name from the bedroom, where a bed awaited her. She had been on a stakeout before but had been able to sleep a least four to five hours per shift, and then continue to spy. But with Fang gone for most of the day, neither of them had been able to sleep and it seemed wrong to suddenly go rest.

Rubbing the corner of her right eye, she turned her head around and continued the task she had been doing the entire day without feeling the need to complain.

"Farron?"

"Yeah?"

"Got rest for a while. I'll wake you up in a few hours."

"There's no need to, I'm fine."

"Please," Fang said, only now looking directly at her. "Just go rest, I'll be okay."

Wanting to complain, Lightning was quickly forced to shut her mouth only by the sight of a hand being risen in the air. With a tight smile, she got up from the chair and slowly made her way towards the bedroom, her headache still savagely thumping against her temples.

Getting onto the bed, she let herself fall until her back was against the mattress and tightly closed her eyes. Only a few minutes passed, the faint sound of music coming from the living-room reminding her she was not alone in the middle of nowhere, and oddly, Fang's presence was somehow reassuring. Puffing at her thoughts, she deleted them all one by one and let herself be drawn into a deep sleep.


	8. Eight

It was nine in the morning when Lightning emerged from the elevator looking like a ghost. The tired lines that had decided to be drawn on her face hadn't been covered up by her concealer, and the mascara that had smudged at the corner of her eyes simply gave the impression she had come back from a one-night stand and nothing else.

Awkwardly smiling at the few officers staring at her perplexed as she quietly walked towards her office, all Lightning wanted to do was to crawl into a hole and never come out of it. Entering her office, she instantly turned on the lights and closed all the blinds before she was able to go sit at her desk, ignoring the few files that had been added to a rather long pile. Never had she seen more than three piled-up before, and the thought soon began to haunt her.

But with the beginning of sleep deprivation, Lightning was unable to pick one up and enter the data on her computer. Instead, she pushed them all away and settled her forehead against the cold glass desk. Slowly breathing in and out, she forcefully tried to fight the state of tiredness that had taken control over her ever since had woken her up, a little more than an hour ago.

Though the ride back to the city had been awfully quiet, closing an eye had been a task impossible to achieve for a reason she hadn't been able to figure out. All she knew was that every time her head had started to fall to the side, she had instinctively woken up in a state of alert, dream, and thoughts impossible to differentiate. But whatever they had been had turned out to be less than pleasing, making it impossible for her to concentrate or even sleep.

Lifting her head up from the desk, she tiredly gazed at its surface with her lips shaped into a straight line of displease. She needed to be done with them before anyone would see the disaster lying on it. It was with great courage and strength that Lightning was able to turn on the computer and pick up the first file, firstly giving it a quick read to recall the events to had led to this person's arrest, and the memories all came back running.

Making sure she sat in the right position, her fingers automatically started to press on the keyboard, entering one by one all the data she needed to add. During the hour she spent doing so, a few people had come and gone, asking her to check out details regarding an on-going case, or only to bring her a warm coffee which she had never refused, and the fuel the caffeine had served as had been working perfectly for her brain to reset.

So, when she files had finally been added to the online servers, Lightning felt like a new woman coming out from her office. Though her makeup wasn't on point, she felt a powerful kick of energy streaming through her blood as she walked in direction of Yuj, ready to solve whatever he could give her.

"Good, you're out. We have something…"

"Sounds ominous," Lightning said with a frown, "what's going on?"

"I don't know. Emma just called me, said it was urgent. Your car?"

"Yeah let's go." Walking towards the elevator, she called out for Maqui to join them quickly and was walking towards her car shortly after.

Stomping towards the Mustang, Lightning, and Yuj both exchanged a worried look. It was odd to hear Emma call any situation urgent, usually being a laid-back and relaxed kind of woman. There was no saying what they would find when they'd arrive in a house in a quiet neighbourhood, where the murder of a young woman had occurred. Would there be lots of blood, not enough evidence, a scene unlike any other?

Questions began to form inside, and the more she asked herself, the more urgent it became to her to have an answer. Pressing on the pedal, she rushed her car towards the scene of the crime and parked next to Emma's car as she arrived at her destination ten long minutes later.

Showing her badge to the officers blocking the entrance, the first thing that stuck out as she entered the house was the strong scent of iron, and everyone knew that iron and blood possessed similar smells. It was a smell she had been able to smell many times, but never had it been so strong. It was only when she looked down to the ground that she spotted the many traces of blood, footprints, and handprints nearly covering the entire marbled ground.

With a quick glance over her shoulder, she frowned in Yuj's direction and carefully followed the steps with gloves now covering both of her hands.

Ending at a first door, Lightning glanced at the inside of a bedroom and carefully entered the room, her eyes painfully trying to adjust to the scenery presented before her eyes. And the time she took was significant enough for Yuj to understand that something was indeed very wrong.

Standing on the bed was a severed head. Female, Caucasian, merely old enough to have a drink at the bar. Both her eyes had been gouged out and the placed before it, as well as almost the majority of her teeth. Taking a step closer, she carefully observed the traces of hand that had been imprinted around her neck and her eyes, and the conclusion that her eyes had been taking out whilst still being alive suddenly rang alarms inside of her head.

"Holy…"

It was Yuj that whispered that word next to her ear, and all she had been wanting to add was _fuck_. Giving him a look, she turned back around and continued to follow the steps towards another room, trying as hard as possible to prepare herself for what she'd see on the other side of the closed door.

"Hope you didn't have breakfast," a voice called out from the distance.

Looking up from the handle, Lightning shook her head at the sight of Emma exiting the last room of the hallway. "I haven't. I'm glad I didn't."

With her courage being powered in her hand as she grabbed the handle door, she turned it to the right and pushed the door completely open, her hand instinctively going in front of her nose to cover up the horrendous smell escaping the room. Rotten, pee and even vomit had mixed together to release something even she couldn't handle.

Turning around, she exited the room without giving it a glance and pressed her hand against her stomach. This close to throwing up, she closed her eyes and leaned against the wall, hoping to recover quickly.

"Here, take this," Emma offered, a mask in her hand. "It won't cover it all up, but it should be loads better."

Grabbing it and throwing Emma an appreciative look, Lightning placed the mask over her mouth and nose, breathed in and slowly walked back towards the room. And what she saw was left printed inside of her skull.

She didn't know what colour the walls or even the floor could've been due to the extent of blood and other liquids covering them all. The bedroom she stood in had been destroyed piece by piece, and the body parts that had been left in the middle in a satanic pentagram looked like nothing but the work of a twisted, demented person. Five legs and six arms, fingers in the middle, this was the pure definition of a nightmare.

"What's in the bathroom," she asked without turning her eyes away from this disaster.

"The rest," Emma answered.

"Do we have a…" Swallowing her saliva, Lightning averted her eyes from the body parts and turned around, already walking towards the door. "A reason?"

"Yeah. Sort off. It's in the bathroom. Follow me."

Clenching her jaw, Lightning nodded and followed Emma towards the last room. Hesitant as she stood next to the door, she took in a deep breath and peaked her nose under the frame before completely walking inside the room, her eyes instantly stumbling with three torsos, one leg and one head. The position the parts had been placed were vile, shivers running down her spine at the sight of them representing intercourse in the most vicious way.

Darting away from the floor, she followed Emma's finger's line of sight and gazed at the facing wall. _The voices, they scream_ , she read. _The nights, they never end. The days, they continue. The pain, it flows._ Looking at the right-side wall, it continued. _The lust, it grows. The hunger, it succeeds. The sin, it appears._

"Jesus fucking Christ," she whispered under her breath, "This is…"

"Yeah. It is."

Coming closer to the wall, Lightning gingerly looked at the traces the fingers had left and was quickly disappointed the moment she noticed the pattern similar of the one of a glove.

Rushing out of the bathroom, she walked back towards the living-room followed by her detectives and other officers, carefully avoiding every bloody print that had been left on the ground.

"Okay. We're going to swipe out this place like crazy. I don't care how long it takes, I don't care how much your backs will hurt. We need something from the people that did this, and now."

Looking at them all as they nodded in her direction, Lightning was quick to join them in a thorough investigation of the house. Finding out that the bodies found were the ones of three unrelated people, she knew that her work wouldn't be cut out for her. If anything, this case was likely to bring more additional troubles she didn't need. With Fang's case and now this one, there was no saying when she'd finally be able to get a proper good night of sleep. _You asked for it though_ , she thought to herself in a quick moment of panic, scraping off the few prints she had been able to find.

She had seen her fair share of horrors throughout her life, but something like this was new to her. Perhaps was it because of the over-excessive use of violence, but something about this triple murder sounded a lot worse than anything she had ever lived, Fang's case included. She wasn't diminishing it, not in the least, but this amount of cruelty was way worse than a simple throat sliced.

But then… An idea came to her mind and quickly retrieving her gloves, Lightning was back on the street with her phone at her ear.

 _"What?"_

Biting her inner-lip, Lightning wondered if she should simply hang up. A butt-call could happen, right? "Hi, am I bothering you?"

 _"Just papers and stuff. What is it? What do you need?"_

Frowning, Lightning wondered if she truly was _this_ predictable. "I do," she said through gritted teeth. "I have a case and it's important."

 _"How important?"_

"Important."

A silence spread between them. Looking at the street, Lightning noticed the few journalists already gathering towards them and being pushed back by other officers that had now joined the scene. With four deaths in more than a week and a triple murder, the neighbourhood was on the verge of explosion.

 _"What do you need?"_

"Info on a certain Jessica Lore, Stephen Jenix and Alyson Roverburg."

 _"Is that all?"_

"Yes," Lightning said, ignoring the obvious sarcasm, "That's all."

Clearly hearing a deep sigh, Lightning was biting her inside lip and prepared herself for a refusal. Fang didn't need to give her any help anyway, did she? _"Alright. Let me get back to you."_

She wasn't given the chance to reply, or even thank her. The connection was abruptly cut off, and Lightning was left in the middle of the street, looking at the few journalists that still hadn't decided to leave. _Why does blood always interest people? What's it with the need for violence?_

Shaking her head, she went back inside the house, picked up a new pair of gloves and continued her investigation of the premises alongside Yuj, Maqui, and Emma. After more than thirty minutes and a stomach starting to hurt, it was the ruckus coming from the street that brought her back on her feet, a brow arched in direction of the door.

She went in its direction and pulled it open, observing a couple fighting to go under the security banner and trying to push away the officers blocking their way.

"Let us in, this is our house," one of them said.

"What happened? Officer! Officer!"

Walking down the few steps leading to the street, Lightning made her way towards the couple and led them further away towards a place no journalist was at.

"What's going on," the taller woman between the two them said, her brows eyes worriedly looking at their house.

"Are you the owners of this house?"

"Yes, yes. We've lived here for six years."

"Alright." Looking over her shoulder, Lightning gave Yuj a small sign of the hand and watched him go back inside with a frown. "There's been a murder inside of your house during the night," Lightning then told them, "I'm sorry but we can't let you back inside."

"You're kidding, right?"

"No. I will need you to come down the precinct to ask you some questions."

"But where are we supposed to go?"

"Ask a friend, or your family to take you in for a few days," Lightning said, already going back to the house, "I'm sorry for the inconvenience."

She ignored the two women arguing and strode back towards the house. With the extent of the wreckage, there was no point in asking these women if they needed anything from the house. It would probably be covered in blood anyway, or something else.

* * *

It was around three in the afternoon when Lightning's e-mail address chimed. Intensively focused on the on-going case and after a long interrogation of the house's owners, Lightning still hadn't been able to find a connection between either of them. But little did she know that the beginning of the answer could be found in the exact e-mail she had received.

However, Lightning had already forgotten about the favour she has asked and continued to look at the whiteboard, Yuj by her side.

So far all they knew was this: these three people lived in different neighbourhoods, had different ages, different races and had never been seen together. The families that had come to the precinct hadn't been able to give them much more information either, and their clues had run dry. Not to mention not a single fingerprint had been found on the premises able to lead them to the killer, or killers.

Running her hand through her hair, Lightning sat at the edge of the desk and helplessly looked at the board. No murder weapon, even though Emma suggested a machete based on the wounds and cuts that had been inflicted, no witnesses in the entire area had been able to see anything or even hear a single sound. Something was amiss.

"Lieutenant?"

Looking away from the board, Lightning went closer to Maqui. "Yes?"

"I found this video footage, I thought it was worth watching."

Frowning, Lightning grabbed a nearby chair and sat down in front of the computer, waiting for Maqui to press play.

The footage showed a red-coloured van carefully driving around the neighbourhood from two in the morning until five. It never stopped, only going in a circle as to stand guard for any police vehicles or even the owners' car.

"Do you have a plate?"

"Yes, but it belongs to one of our victims, Jessica."

"Alright." Blowing out a breath, Lightning went back to the beginning of the video and pressed play again, trying to perceive whoever was driving the van.

But this hadn't been done just for fun, or to try. The people who had committed these atrocious murders had been aware of every security camera, and had therefore managed to hide their faces every single time.

"Ask anyone in the state to look out for the van."

"Already did," Maqui said, a smile on his lips. "I learned from the best."

Shaking her head ever so slightly, Lightning gave her detective a small tap on the shoulder and immediately went back towards her office.

Sitting back at the edge of her desk, she carefully observed as Yuj added information and guidelines between the pictures of dismembered bodies and the victims, adding question marks next to the number of pieces that had been cut.

Eighteen pieces. Six legs, six arms, three torsos and three heads. Despite it being the numeric value of life, in Hebrew, Lightning couldn't possibly say what it could've meant. _Maybe nothing. But it's too specific. Why cut off the heads? Why cut anything at all?_

"What are you thinking about," Yuj asked.

"I'm trying to remember the biblical meaning of eighteen. Remember what was written on the walls?"

"Yeah? I wish I could un-see it though."

"The murder uses the words sin, lust, hunger. The deadly sins if you want. We need to figure out more about these people. Their hobbies, their jobs. The families weren't of much help."

"Well," Yuj said, "they were grieving."

"I know, I know… But it's like there's something they're not telling us."

"Aren't you just saying that because of the FBI, and that other case?"

Arching a brow, Lightning vividly shook her head. The two situations were completely different, and more importantly, she has been right about it being more complicated than they believed. But God prevented her from saying anything about it.

"It's not the same. I'm sure there's something more here. Something we can't see."

"The devil?"

Rolling her eyes to the ceiling, Lightning stood up from the desk and cane closer to the board, her arms crossed on her chest. Focusing her undivided attention on the pictures of the bodies, and how they had been placed throughout the room, Lightning painfully tried to find a link she could've missed.

"Oh, you received an e-mail by the way," Yuj said after a few minutes, "well, a second one."

"Alright."

Going back to her desk, Lightning wiggled the mouse and waited for the screen to be clear again. Clicking on her emails, she did her best to hide her pleasant surprise at the sight of the word Confidential used as a title.

Double clicking on the link, she waited for the e-mail to load and began to read.

 _Hey, Farron._

 _I did some digging about these people to find a link and I found one. What would you do without me, right?_

Frowning, Lightning clenched her fists and continued to read.

 _Apparently, they were all in the same jury, three weeks ago. Some story about the murder of a young girl. They were the only ones saying Paul Harmon was guilty. Them and a fourth chick. Tara Lockwood. Her address is 234 Garden Street. I'm going there to make sure she's alive. See you._

As if the devil had been chasing after her, Lightning was extremely quick to leave her office and rush down the stairs of the precinct, not bothering to give anyone a particular reason why she was now leaving.

Making sure her gun was still at her waist, she got inside of her car and drove away, out from West-Hollywood and towards Pasadena, a little further up north.

Why Fang had decided to go investigate was a mystery, and incredibly dangerous. Without any backup, there was no saying what could be waiting for her behind that door. With that in mind, she slammed her foot harder against the accelerator and stormed down the streets, her sirens on full-blast.

It's only when she was close to the address that Lightning slowed down the car and turned the blares off, carefully looking on both her sides to try and find number 234. Luckily, the car that was parked a little further down the road was helpful enough, the fact Fang would only drive a Mustang seeming perfectly logical. _Better than mine._

Parking her car behind Fang's, Lightning gave the house a quick glance and exited her Mustang, her left hand glued to her gun. Coming to the door, she knocked three consecutive times and listened to the voices coming from the inside of the house, her brows furrowing as seconds started to pass. Ready to knock once more, the door was abruptly opened by a young woman, Fang standing directly by her side.

"Took you long enough."

"Ma'am," Lightning said as she ignored Fang's comment, "I'm Lieutenant Farron with the LAPD, do you mind if I come inside and ask you a few questions?"

"Well, I've told your colleague everything I knew…"

Glaring at Fang, Lightning said, "Yes, but it's better to have the version two times. Maybe you'll remember something in the process."

"Alright, sure, come in."

Taking a step inside the house, the proud smile that had now invaded Fang's face surprisingly unfazed her. Perhaps was she now used to her annoying habits, smirk and whatnot, or maybe she simply didn't care about them anymore, accepting them as a trait of Fang's personality.

"What's going on, exactly," the woman asked.

"There's been a triple murder during the night," Lightning answered, whilst taking a seat on the couch.

"Yes, Agent Yun told me but…why?"

"Did you have contact with the three victims," Lightning asked, uninterested about the questions being asked to her.

"No, not really. We got along very well during the jury, but we're all too different to get along." A snort escaped Tara as she spoke, darting back and forth between Fang and Lightning.

"What kind of differences?"

"Well, from what I remember, Jessica seemed…kind of like a nymphomaniac. Every time she saw a hot guy all she talked about was sex." A shiver ran down Lightning's spine. Why was everything always related to sex? "Stephen was pedantic. Very high-self-esteem. Drove me crazy. And Alyson…I think she was a drug addict. I'm not sure though."

"Oh, she was," Fang interjected, "Heroine, cocaine, methamphetamine."

"Ha, it's what I thought. But yeah, we all had our differences."

"What makes you different," Lightning asked, the tip of her pen against her paper.

"What do you mean?"

Standing up, Lightning went towards a couple of pictures placed above a fireplace and looked at the people standing in them. "If you had to be one of the seven sins, which one would you be?"

"One of the seven sins?"

Suppressing a frustrated sigh and wondering if Tara would eventually understand anything, Lightning turned around and planted her gaze at the woman. For now, she believed they had found lust, pride, and gluttony, meaning that greed, wrath and sloth. Somehow, Lightning began to think that the latter could be the one representing this woman, based on mess piled up in several corners of the rooms.

"What's the deal Farron?"

"There was a satanic sign made with body parts, and a message was left on the wall. It talked about sins, and I wondered if the targets represented those sins."

"Well, seems like it." Surprised, Lightning gave Fang a look and was met with a frown. "You have a long couple of days ahead of you."

"We're going to place this house under surveillance for a few days. Do you have somewhere you can stay?"

"Ye—yes, I'll ask my sister."

"Good." Giving the house one last glance, she brought her phone to her ear and waned Yuj of the situation before she turned to look at Fang. "You should go before they come."

"Worried about me, Sunshine?"

"Don't call me that, and no. I'm worried about our careers, nothing else."

"Such a charmer, it's hard not to fall for you."

Huffing, Lightning gave Tara a tight smile and went in direction of the door. Standing outside, she brought her pants further up towards her hips and stuffed her white shirt back underneath the fabric. Still continuously falling, she brought her belt to a new hole and sauntered in direction of her car without giving the house another glance.

"Farron, wait a second."

Stopping in her tracks, she looked over her shoulder and waited for Fang to join with her. "What is it?"

"First, you're welcome, and second can you slow down for a bit? I need to talk to you."

"Alright," Lightning said with a sigh.

"Let's go in my car."

Nodding, Lightning followed Fang to her Mustang and sat down on the passenger seat. The smell coming from her ca perfectly matched her persona: vanilla, coffee, monoi… It was exotic. _So, who cares? You're not here to smell her, you're here to work._

"Can anyone else take care of it, the case?"

"Why?"

"Because you need to make a choice, Lightning. You either continue with this one or with me."

"I can't do both?"

"I don't know, can you?"

"You just fucking watch me, Fang."

Pushing the passenger door open, Lightning slammed it back with force and gave Fang the finger before she stormed in direction of her car. Sitting behind her wheel, she glared at navy-coloured Mustang and stopped herself from repeatedly slamming the wheel. Instead, she brought her keys inside and turned the ignition on.

Tomorrow was New Year's Eve. Thankfully, 2018 was soon over and done.


	9. Nine

The night had fallen a few minutes ago. Replacing the bright blue sky, infinite stars were now covering everything in sight, the shining planets looking over from the distance, so far away. Standing in the middle of Serah's garden, Lightning was looking at them all, a cigarette dangling between her fingers. She didn't know where Snow and Serah had disappeared to less than ten minutes ago, but she also refused to find out.

So, with a temperature of 75F°, Lightning had made her way out the house and had suddenly been drawn to the illuminations in the sky and not once she had moved. Well, only to bring her cigarette to her lips, that is. But with the sound of crickets and the one of the wind blowing through the trees, Lightning had never felt more at peace. Strange, based on the amount of work she had willingly trapped herself in.

You can do this, Lightning. You're strong enough to achieve that, Lightning. Her own actions sometimes puzzled her. How could she take care of two equally important cases at the same time? What did she have to prove? Or to who, did she need to prove anything? Fang, that obnoxious FBI Agent who had gotten under her skin more than once only by being present in the same room, or to Amodar, the only person she truly needed to show that she was capable of doing something, no matter the cost.

But somehow…Lightning knew Amodar didn't matter in this equation. It had become an obsession to prove to Fang what she could do and somehow, she even wondered if the case mattered at all. _Of course, it matters. It's a chance to avenge the victims. You're not only doing this so you can show you're a good cop. Right?_

Shaking her head ever so slightly, Lightning brought her cigarette to her lips and gently inhaled the smoke between her lungs, keeping it static for just a few moments before blowing it all away in the air. It had been a full day now since she had suffered through one of her migraines. One day since she had swallowed one of those goddamn pills or felt the need to smoke some drugs to soothe her inside and the feeling it released was more than pleasant.

"Hey, Light?"

"Yeah?"

"Did I mention that a colleague from mine is also coming? She's new here and doesn't have many friends. She's bringing her sister, too."

"Sure, it's fine."

Turning around, she gave her younger sister a strange look and ignore the fact one of the buttons on her shirt had been misplaced. The wince on her face, however, and the fact she was now staring at the blouse couldn't be stopped, and it was soon that Serah realized the mistake she had made.

Soon, the colour of her cheeks was the only thing Lightning was able to look at, and darting over Serah's shoulder, Snow appeared.

"Light please…"

"He can't keep it in his pants for more than a few hours," she asked, her nostrils now flaring with rage.

"It was me okay? IT wasn't him. My hormones are out of control and…"

"Let's end this conversation right now," Lightning said, nearly pleading. "I hope the rest of the night will go nicely or I might have to commit a murder."

"Whose?"

Ready to answer, their conversation was abruptly cut by the sound of the bell echoing through the house. Lifting up a finger in the air, Serah sauntered towards the door and Lightning followed from the distance, stubbing her cigarette out on the patio.

Coming inside the house, she first glanced at the Christmas tree still shining in the corner of the living-room and automatically made her way inside of the kitchen, displeased by Snow's presence in the room. Lifting her nose up at him, she snatched the bottle of white wine from the counter and poured herself a glass, almost to the top, before she dank one first sip with her eyes now closed. She listened to the voices, hushed by the closed door and the laughter that echoed in her ears.

One she didn't recognize. Taking another sip, she poured herself some wine once more until her glass was full again and elegantly walked out of the kitchen with her brightest, fakest smile on her lips.

Giving thee living room a quick glance, Lightning was surprised to find no one in the nearest vicinity. Trying to listen to the conversations coming from the garden, she followed the sharp, quirky voice of who she only assumed to be the mysterious co-worker. Headed in that direction, she however spun around with her glass at her lips as the sound of the toilet being flushed was made from the bathroom.

"Ah Lightning, there you are!"

Staring at the person coming out of the toilet, Lightning completely ignored her sister calling out for her name from the garden. She felt as if her feet had been glued to the ground, but then again, _she_ hadn't moved a single finger either. It was in silence that they analyzed one another, judged and stared, neither of them fighting to keep a smile on their faces.

"Ha, Fang! Meet my sister, Lightning. Light, this is Fang and her younger sister, Vanille."

"Pleasure," Lightning quietly uttered, still looking at Fang standing in the hallway. "A real goddamn pleasure."

"Light? You're about to break the glass so why don't I take that from you," Serah offered, already seizing the glass in her hand, "and let's just sit down in the living-room? Can you help me bring some stuff, Light? Please?"

"Sure thing…"

Breaking the long eye-contact, Lightning followed Serah inside the kitchen and made sure the door was locked before giving her a piece of her mind.

"What is she doing here? What's the meaning of this?"

"What…do you mean, exactly," Serah asked, looking seemingly perplexed.

"Fang. Why is she here?"

"I told you I invited Vanille…And Fang happens to be her sister. Why? Do you know her?"

"Do I know her," Lightning whispered under her breath, now seeing nothing but red.

She paused for a few seconds. Could she claim to know her, after all? The only things she knew were her name, occupation and now, the fact that she had a sister.

"I don't know her," Lightning admitted with a shake of the head.

"Alright? Uh, can you bring this out, my hands are going to be full."

Glancing at the two plates of mini quiches and other assortments, Lightning blew out a deep sigh and carefully grabbed the two plates. Without giving her sister another look, and being really angry about the turns of events, she exited the kitchen with murder on her mind, her thoughts turning into carnage at the sight of Fang chatting with Snow.

She wasn't really surprised to see them getting along. The phrase opposites attract sometimes held its meaning but in this case, like seeks like was more accurate.

"Oh, Lightning is that right?" Looking up from her heels, Lightning nodded in direction of Vanille, a cute, short red-head almost possessing the same magnetic eyes as her sister. "Do you need help with something?"

"No, but thanks for offering," Lighting answered as she placed the plates on the table. Standing back straight, she gave Fang a dark look and was immediately drawn back to Vanille squeaking like a bird being tortured. "Everything okay?"

"Oh yes! I just love mini-quiches they're so good!"

"Lightning made those actually. It doesn't look like it, but my sister is actually a great cook."

Clearing her throat, Lightning grabbed her glass of wine Serah had placed on the table and slowly sat down on the couch, her legs crossed.

Wearing a red dress for the evening and tall black high-heels, Lightning didn't feel at ease in the slightest. Usually more accustomed to jeans or shirts, feeling a gap between her legs was less than pleasing. But as a promise to Serah, she hadn't gotten any other choice but to wear this for their night.

"What else do you cook," Fang asked, a teasing smile on her lips.

"I don't know, not much."

"Come on sis, give yourself some credit! It's not because you refuse to eat that…What?"

Serah had known her sister for…ever, really. And if there was something Lightning didn't like, it was to be put on the spot or judged because of her life choices. And in less than thirty seconds, Snow had managed to do both. Sipping from her glass of wine, Lightning remained silent but emotionally distraught. Anger and shame had morphed into something rather unpleasant, and her response was to flee.

However, refusing to let anything show to the guests Serah had invited, Lightning desperately fought to remain unfazed by the situation. And somehow, she succeeded.

"I do eat, Snow, I just don't stuff my face with cheeseburgers every goddamn day."

"I don't eat cheeseburgers every day," Snow countered.

"The last time you called me, which was two hours ago, you clearly stated that you had just eaten _the best fucking burger in your life_ , and I'm supposed to believe that?"

Music suddenly started to play through Serah's speakers. Caught off by its sudden noise, Lightning was quick to drop the conversation she didn't want to have and continued sipping on her wine as quietly as possible. This was one of those days where she prayed to morph with the couch, therefore becoming invisible to others. But with lingering stare Fang had been throwing at her, Lightning knew this wasn't one of those days.

"What is it, Fang?"

"I still want to know what you cook."

"Seriously?"

"Ya-huh. I have a feeling you're more of a dessert girl…"

"Oh," Serah interjected, a smile on her lips, "you're so wrong. She _hates_ everything with sugar."

Nodding, Lightning glanced back and forth between Serah and Fang. "I prefer salt."

"Is that why you're so…salty?"

She hadn't really thought it would be possible. Only a few people had managed to create this, but somehow, Fang had managed to make her _smile_. Not falsely, or in a hypocritical manner, but truly smile. And God knew she wasn't going to let it be seen.

With her lips pressed together, she nodded and muttered a _hm-hm_ before standing up from the sofa with a cigarette dangling between her lips. Bringing the lighter closer to the tip and protecting the flame with her hand still holding her glass of wine, Lightning quickly inhaled the smoke and blew it all away in the air, a small shiver parkouring her body as the wind suddenly brushed at the nape of her neck.

"So, salty girl," Fang said, lighting her own cigarette, "Fancy meeting you here."

"Fancy and unpleasantly unexpected."

"Ouch, that hurt." Glancing to her right, Lightning shook her head at Fang's melodramatic acting of being stabbed through the heart. "Come on, let's bury the hatchet for tonight. Then you can continue to hate me as you please."

"I don't hate you, Fang."

The words had left her mouth so quickly that Fang wasn't the only surprised by them. Frowning to herself, Lightning took a sip from her wine followed by a long drag on her cigarette, looking over in the distance.

"I'm surprised. I really thought you did."

"Well, it seems like…I don't. It doesn't mean I like you, though."

"Ha."

Silence spread between them both as they looked in the same direction. Listening to the wind becoming increasingly louder, Lightning fought for her hair to stay in place until eventually, she caved in. Sighing as quietly as possible, Fang's chuckle wasn't. Looking in her direction, she nearly flinched as her green-coloured eyes savagely bore into hers and soon, it was impossible to look anywhere else.

Parting her lips to say anything at all, she quickly pressed them back together, the heavy silence between them continuing to invade their surroundings but not once did she look away. Truth was, she couldn't. She couldn't look elsewhere than directly at her, to stare into her eyes.

"Light?"

"Hm?"

"We're going to eat soon, I could use your help?"

"Be right there."

Incapable of moving, it was Fang that managed to get her out of her state of wonder. Clicking her fingers in front of her face, the result was efficient. Clearing her throat, she stubbed what was left of her cigarette in the ashtray and disappeared from the garden with cheeks burning like wild-fire.

Entering the kitchen, she instantly went in direction of the fridge and placed her glass of wine near the sink, retrieving a bottle of water from which she drank half of it in merely a few seconds under Serah's suspicious gaze.

"Are you okay Light?"

"I'm fine, I just got a little light-headed."

"That's what you say every time you have a migraine."

She shook her head and turned around. "I don't have one, really."

"How was your appointment by the way?"

"My…Oh. Right. I had to cancel, something else came up with work."

"Do you have another?"

"Yeah, next week", Lightning calmly answered. "They were able to give me one quickly."

"Alright, good!" Placing the bottle back in the fridge, Lightning turned around and gazed at Serah with knitted brows. A smile had started to form on her lips, and one she didn't like seeing at all.

"What?"

"You and Fang… I don't know. It's weird."

Clearing her throat, Lightning gave Serah a confused look. "Weird?"

"Yeah. Chemistry, if you want."

"Nonsense. I dislike the woman."

"Whatever you say, Light. Can you grab the wine from the fridge?"

Meaning to answer, Lightning was left alone in the kitchen without having a say. Gritting her teeth together, she grabbed the wine and automatically went towards the door. However, she stopped before reaching for the handle. Taking in a deep breath, Serah's assumptions suddenly hit her like a baseball bat. Shaking her head and mentally kicking herself, she exited the kitchen after breathing out a deep sigh and brought the bottle to the living-room.

Sitting on the couch, Serah and Fang seemed to be in an intense conversation whilst Vanille and Snow were standing before the glass-door. Between talking to Fang or Snow, Lightning's decision was quickly made: turning around, she sat down on an arm-chair far from both groups and silently continued to think.

"So, she often does that?"

"More than you think."

"Why?"

"I think she likes to be alone better than with people."

Blinking, Lightning focused her attention on Serah and Fang. "You make it sound like I'm asocial."

"Well, aren't you?"

"I'm more of a misanthrope."

"That's not exactly better, Light…"

A flicker of a smile shadowed on Lightning's lips as she darted up from her glass to gaze at Serah. The look she gave her was the one she had seen a thousand times before. It wasn't really pity, but more despair. Despair because her older sister continuously refused to be around people, no matter the circumstances.

Serah had never understood why she disliked other beings as much as she did, but she hadn't been able to blame her. Even she didn't quite know why she felt this rage every time someone would talk to her. Even if it was just to ask for the time, there was always a resentment. Something inexplicable. And in comparison, Serah was the loveliest girl you could meet. She always had a smile on, always ready to help others, to be there for them, to listen.

Lightning was nothing like that. Sometimes, she even wondered if the same blood was running down their veins.

"Well, in any case, that's my sister for you, right," Serah tried to joke. Fang chuckled, but only to be polite, and Lightning continued to look at her younger sister.

"In case you didn't notice," Lightning said, her attention now drawn to Fang, "My sister and I are nothing alike."

"We're like black and white!"

"Who's black and who's white, then," Fang asked. The interested tone in her voice sounded genuine, but she couldn't possibly figure out why. This conversation wasn't interesting in the slightest.

"Well…I guess…I'm white," Serah said. She glanced in Lightning's direction for a split second but wasn't met with a look. "And she's black."

"Colour me surprised," Fang said to avoid a silence that had already started to settle. "You do look a lot alike, physically, that is."

"I suppose we are," she calmly responded, her head slightly tilted to the side.

Not once during their exchange did she look at anyone else but Fang. It was strange, really, to be so absorbed by a person she didn't like, or never would become friends with. But there was a magnetic feeling that she couldn't quite understand, nor could she stop it.

"Snow? Can you pour the wine into the glasses?"

"Sure thing."

It's only when Snow tried to grab the bottle she had kept in her hands that Lightning realized she hadn't let go of it in the past five minutes, clinging to it like baby to its milk-bottle. She gave Snow a warning look as he approached her vicinity and poured the four glasses herself, her own still in her right hand.

It was something she did, sometimes. To drink and forget about the people who wanted to drink as well. Maybe was it because she so desperately wanted to be alone that sometimes, she truly believed she was.

"Serah, should I pour yours?"

"Hm, no. I'll have a glass of Champagne at midnight, but none for me at the moment."

"Alright."

As three of the four glasses were poured, Lightning went back to the arm-chair and regained the same position than before; legs crossed, head tilted to the side, staring at the abyss. She sometimes wondered of by staring directly at it, the abyss looked back in return.

"Well, cheers. Thank you for inviting us, Serah," Vanille said with a bright smile. It seemed like there was no end to her good mood. "And thanks for showing me the West-Coast, it was hard to come here and be alone but…I don't know, you made think like I was part of the family."

Everyone smiled at Vanille's words. Everyone, but Lightning.

* * *

She had counted. Every time she had gone out for a cigarette, she had counted. In total, Lightning had been standing in the garden seventeen times to smoke, equal to more than half-an-hour. Every time she had accompanied her but had thought it wise to stay behind, near the living-room glass door so she could continue her conversation with Serah, as known as the exact opposite of her older sister.

It was amusing to notice such intense differences between them both. Where Lightning was cold, Serah had a heart filled with warmth. Where she was calculating, Serah was laid-back and innocent. There wasn't a trait the Farron sisters shared.

Looking in the distance, Fang brought her cigarette to her lips and gazed at Lightning's shadow. She had been standing in the middle of the garden for more than a few minutes, oblivious of the countdown to a new year that had already commenced. But then, it was hard to figure what Lightning Farron, Lieutenant with the LAPD truly cared about. Money? Doubtful. Family? Please. Her job? Certainly, but not as much as she wanted to. Herself? She doubted it. Although she seemed to be careful about her demeanor, her weight or even the way she dressed, Lightning didn't seem to be particularly enjoying her life.

The woman truly was a mystery. An enigma worth treating as a case. But without the certain animosity Lightning felt towards, Fang knew this would be a lost cause. A shame really. Perhaps they would've been able to get along.

"What about you, Fang?" Looking at her sister, Fang ached her brow. She hadn't listened to a single word of the conversation. "Your resolutions for the New Year?"

"Oh. Same as always. Making sure the streets are a little safer."

"Great job so far."

She didn't know what had angered her the most about this petty comment: Lightning's tone of voice, or the fact she even dared to make a comment. Sharply turning around, Fang stared at the woman who had managed to trigger a feeling of rage she hadn't felt in a long time.

They were only a few inches apart, no more than twenty, but their eyes were visible even in the dark. They would've been in the darkest of nights, to be fair. Mischief shone from Lightning's, and murder overflowed from Fang's.

"What did you just say?"

"I said great job so far," Lightning repeated. The calm tone she had used the entire evening was slowly getting on her nerves. "Need me to say it again?"

"Lightning what's gotten into you," Serah asked, now standing closer to Fang.

"Nothing." She shook her head and stared at the grass. "Excuse me."

Fang followed her with her stare as she entered the living room and disappeared inside the bathroom, slamming the door close.

"Your sister sure is something, eh?"

"I'm sorry. I think that with the case, the murders that keep coming…"

"Don't forget her migraines," Snow whispered. "She can become…mean when she has some."

"They happen a lot?"

She stubbed her cigarette in the ashtray and went back inside the house. The bathroom door was still closed, and only the sound of water was coming from inside the room. _A goddamn mystery._

"It happens often. Well, it's been five years now."

"Five years?"

"Yes. It happened after one of her very first cases, when she was still a detective," Serah said, a saddened look in her eyes. "She killed a prime suspect in an investigation, but she never knew why she pulled the trigger."

"I read about this case," Fang admitted, "It was the murderer, right?"

"Yes, it was. It was him, but a part of Lightning never… Never accepted it."

Fang's brows furrowed. She intertwined her fingers and gazed at her nails, trying to figure out why she had never been able to accept killing a man who had killed plenty.

"Did she kill anyone after?"

"She shot people, but this man was the first and last." Serah paused and gave Fang a look. "She interests you, doesn't she?"

"What do you mean?"

"I saw the way you two talk. You're not strangers, are you?"

Fang had been wrong. Incredible wit and intelligence were shared traits in the Farron family. "What makes you say that, exactly?"

Leaning back in the couch after grabbing her glass of wine, Fang first flickered her eyes to the right. In two minutes, 2019 would begin. Another shitty year. Another flock of unwanted memories. Perhaps the possibility to atone for what she had caused, but somehow, she doubted she'd ever be able to fix the broken jar her loose hand had let fall to the floor.

"Well, when I came looking for Light earlier…The way she looked at you. It was something I hadn't seen before."

"Alright," Fang said, intrigued. "What kind of look?"

"It was anger but there was some sort of…admiration. She admires you."

"I highly doubt it. If anything, she seems to hate me more than anything else."

"Oh please," Serah said with a shake of the head, "Lightning doesn't _hate_. She believes that hate and love are one and the same: useless feelings." She chuckled at her words. It almost seemed like she talked about a person who had passed away. Like Serah was reminiscing. "But how do you know her?"

Fang sighed and brought her finger to her nose. Being an FBI agent wasn't a secret to anyone really. She wasn't a spy working for the CIA.

"I'm the FBI agent in charge of the quadruple murder." Serah looked stunned, her mouth slightly open. "I'm Agent Yun, the one person she truly hates on this planet."

A silence passed. And then, laughter echoed. Perplexed, Fang gazed at Serah as she stood up from the couch, wiping a tear away from her eye. What had been able to cause such a reaction was a mystery, but one she knew wouldn't take long to understand.

"Trust me, she doesn't hate you," Serah said after managing to calm down.

"How could you possibly know that?"

"Because she talks about you. _A lot._ "

Scratching the back of her neck, Fang gazed at the three people before her. Vanille winked at her. She knew what she wanted to say but preferred to remain quiet. "It's not because she talks about that she likes me."

"Then you clearly don't know her," Serah mused. "The only time I heard her talk about someone so much was…"

"It was no one."

Suddenly interrupting, Lightning emerged from the bathroom with her arms crossed on her chest. She had a wave of anger in her eyes, a rage consuming her from within as her eyes settled on Serah, and that rage only seemed to grow when she stared directly back at Fang.

"It was no one," she repeated once more. "The countdown's almost over."

Focusing her attention back on the TV, Fang tried to ignore the strong scent of marijuana now tainting on Lightning's clothes as she took a seat by her side. She glanced in her direction, her blue-coloured eyes tainted in tiny red spots, but the anger had yet to wash away. It seemed something doomed to failure if you asked her. Nothing would ever be able to please Lightning Farron.

"3,2,1…Happy New Year!"

Excitement filled the house within a few seconds. Standing up from the couch, Fang directly went closer to Vanille and pulled her into a long, warm hug. She had so much redeeming to do, so much she needed to fix between her and her sister. She knew Vanille wasn't a resentful person, she knew she had forgiven her minutes after but sometimes when she looked inside her eyes…Fang saw. She saw the pain she had caused and the ruckus she had created. It was all she could see.

So, it didn't matter if the hug lasted longer than she had planned. Right now, all Fang needed was to know Vanille was safe. It was all she cared about.

Taking a step back, she forced a smile and was met with a brighter one. Her features relaxed at the sight of Vanille's shining green eyes but immediately tensed as the living-room window was opened once more. Darting in its direction, she shook her head at Lightning exiting the room and did not hesitate twice before following her to the garden. New Year's was the day of resolutions. And it was time Lightning talked.

"Hey, Farron," she called out, still walking right behind her. "Lightning!"

"What do you want, Fang?"

She grabbed her by the wrist and instantly regretted her action. Met by a slap across the face, Fang's surprise was equal to the one she had felt when she had found out she could never bear children. "Ouch." She said, bringing her hand to her jaw. "That hurt."

"Good. You'll know that touching me is out of bounds."

"With all your phobias I'm having a hard time remembering them all."

"My phobias? Care to share what you've gathered?"

Chuckling, Fang brought her hands to her hips and shortly glanced over her shoulder. Serah, Snow, and Vanille were all standing at attention, trying to see or hear whatever they were sharing. She knew they couldn't, but their presence was somehow reassuring.

"Listen Lightning…I'm leaving town tomorrow. There's been a murder in Dallas and they need me there. Don't do anything, don't try and find another clue. Focus on your satanic man." The sheer look of surprise in her eyes lasted for less than a second. As always, anger was the main emotion. "And let's be fair…this isn't working at all. Destroy everything you knew when you go back home."

"I don't want to stop, Fang. I know what I'm doing."

"No, you don't. Not anymore. Get your anger issues sorted and then give me a call. But until then, you're done."

It was all she said before she turned around and went back to the living-room. She thanked Serah for her hospitality and promised Snow they'd go surfing whenever she'd be back in town. Then, she went towards the front-door with Vanille by her side, and after another long hug, Fang went to her car and drove off without turning back around.

It was strange, what Lightning had managed to create. Somehow, she'd miss that annoyingly thick head of hers. And secretly, she hoped Lieutenant Farron would finally cave in, and try to understand her feelings. But for now, all Fang could do was to leave and solve the case she had helped to create.


End file.
